Who's Psyching Who
by dragonmactir
Summary: Repost of a story that disappeared. EDIT! The story didn't disappear, but the title was different. It is called, on the site, A Clever Title Goes Here, which is doubtless the dumbest title I ever didn't come up with and I don't know why I never changed it when I clearly came up with another title at some point. My memory is awful for that kind of thing.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter One: Pit Bulls and Parolees<strong>

Marlowe Viccellio was excited. And nervous. And more than a little apprehensive. And happy. Incredibly happy. But scared. For fourteen months her life was perfectly structured with few to no surprises - up every day at the same time, fed at the same times, exercised at the same time. Now her life would be her own again, and that was a little bit frightening. Of course, one of the surprising things she'd learned about herself while incarcerated was that she was a lot tougher than she'd ever thought she was. A survivor. She was going to be all right, wherever life took her from here. That was what her boyfriend kept telling her.

_Her boyfriend_. The thought of him gave her all sorts of happy, apprehensive feelings. He said he'd be there to pick her up when she walked out the doors a free woman, and he'd take her home. _Their_ home, the one he'd bought specifically to share with her. A big step, moving in, particularly in light of the fact that they'd never actually had a complete, uninterrupted date where there wasn't a surly guard barking _"No touching!" _at them every time they tried to get close. It was a step she was eager to take regardless. But it was still a little frightening. Once he had a chance to get to know her, _really_ get to know her…what if he found out he didn't like her as much as he thought he did? He was a fighter, a gunslinger. He admired her for her guts and her left hook, but left to her own devices in a world where she didn't _have _to fight…well, Marlowe had always seen herself as more than a bit of a milquetoast. If he started to see her that way, too…

Well. She was just going to have to make sure he never _did_ start to see her that way.

She gathered her few possessions at the final checkpoint and the female guard at the door shook her hand before buzzing her out of the prison into the stark, suddenly enormous world outside the fenced-in yard. Marlowe blinked in the brilliant sunlight and gave her eyes a moment to adjust. The whole world seemed full of extraordinary color, and thankfully only a small portion of it was industrial concrete gray or prison jumpsuit orange. But the only color she really wanted to see was the intense cool-water blue of _his_ eyes.

He…wasn't there.

She felt needle-claws of panic sink into her heart. He was having second thoughts. He didn't want to be stuck with her, why would he? He was a strong, handsome man with a terrific career and there had to be better options for him than an ex-con who was going to have to spend the next year continually checking in with a probation officer. Or maybe something happened while he was at work. A shooting. Maybe he was in the hospital. Maybe he was in the morgue.

"Hello, Marlowe." His voice was a splash of refreshing sanity to her panicked brain. She turned and saw him climbing out of the driver's seat of his Ford Fusion, reassuringly uninjured, smiling, and looking just a little bit shy. "I hope you didn't have to wait long. I didn't mean to be late, but Spencer decided to choose today to stage a major psychic hissy fit at the station, I think because he knew I was supposed to be here to pick you up. Making me late would be just the kind of 'joke' he'd think was enormously funny."

She couldn't speak. She tried once or twice but nothing happened. She held out her arms to him.

He moved to embrace her, but at the exact same instant, just before they reached each other, both of them recoiled instinctively. They looked at each other and burst out laughing. No one was going to tell them not to touch, this time. They hugged and Marlowe shut her eyes tight, drinking in the warm, solid, comforting _reality_ of him. Overwhelmed, she tightened her arms around his neck and threw her legs around him. She climbed him like a tree and kissed him, heedless of any audience this very public display of affection might draw, even when she became aware that several inmates in the prison yard nearby were shouting out catcalls.

"Yeah, Viccellio - take that pig _down_, girl!"

They broke the kiss at that and he put her down. He tugged at the collar of his crisp sky-colored shirt as though it were too tight, but he had the top three buttons undone to showcase that glorious hairy chest. He cleared his throat. A blush was creeping up from the base of his neck to the tips of his ears. "Well, I, uh…thought maybe you'd like to go shopping, er, for some new clothes and such. You probably need a lot of practical things, like a new toothbrush and all that, and I know I could have got that sort of thing for you but I thought maybe you'd rather pick everything out yourself since you know what you like best and all. But I'd, uh…I'd like to get you something special, too. Like a new dress and some jewelry, something like that. To celebrate. And I'd like to take you out to dinner tonight."

And she would like to make him _in_ to dinner tonight. She smiled up at him. "I don't need anything special, Carlton. Except for you."

For a rather pale man, he was capable of turning remarkably red. He cleared his throat again, and she was reminded of Gregory Peck as Captain Horatio Hornblower. "Well. I'd still like to get you something nice. If I could afford it, I'd get you _everything _nice. I hope you don't mind settling for what you can get on a civil servant's salary."

"I don't think of you as 'settling' at all, Carlton," she said honestly, "except that you make me _feel_ settled."

She was a little surprised, by the fire engine color of his cheeks and ears, that smoke wasn't rising from around his collar by this point. He smiled shyly and gestured at the car idling by the curb. "Your chariot awaits, madam," he joked.

"Hold on, let me take a good look at you," she said. He wasn't dressed as she might have expected if he'd come straight from work. He wasn't dressed like she'd expected him to be at all, actually, and she suspected he'd gotten advice from someone, possibly that little blonde partner of his. Under a jet black blazer that emphasized the salt in his gorgeously salt-and-pepper hair, the sky-blue shirt, almost exactly the same color as those amazing eyes, was tucked neatly into a pair of suspiciously new Levis and the heavy black engineer boots under the boot-cut cuffs were also disarmingly casual (and obviously new, as well). He looked, in a word, edible. She imagined trying to focus on shopping for socks and underwear while standing next to _that_ and couldn't quite envision managing to do it without being kicked out of the store and at least _threatened_ with charges of public indecency.

"Maybe…we could worry about shopping _later?" _she suggested, imbuing her voice with as much sultry seduction as she could put into it. Their first and only actual "date" had ended in sexual frustration and her arrest, and the only part of it she begrudged was the frustration. She'd waited more than long enough to satisfy the animal hunger he awoke in her. Even another hour would be pushing the limits of her patience.

He seemed to pick up on that. "Let's go home," he said, a little breathlessly. He held the car door open for her and fairly leapt the hood to get around to the driver's side once she was in. _Home_. A home she would share with this amazing man who should by all rights have given up on her fourteen months ago, when he first discovered what she'd had a hand in doing.

She watched him drive in silence, his attention fixed on the task at hand - maneuvering the hybrid safely through late-afternoon traffic to the older, higher-end part of town where the condominium complex he'd moved to was located. Even something as simple and everyday as that, just driving home, was an act he performed with an attentiveness and focus she marveled at. And in a short while he would turn that single-minded laser focus on _her_. She felt her excitement triple. She couldn't quite stop herself from grabbing his leg, high up on his thigh. He shifted in his seat but didn't take his eyes off the road.

"I don't really think you should be doing that," he said, a little regretfully. "My heart's already beating a thousand miles an hour. Too much of _that_ and I'll never make it home alive."

"You don't have a siren on this car, do you?" she said, half-jokingly.

He reached under his seat and pulled out a portable emergency services flasher. "Actually…"

She started to giggle. "That would be a horrible abuse of your authority, Detective."

"But this is an honest-to-goodness emergency," he said, smiling. "A life may actually depend on my getting your clothes off in the next ten minutes."

"Make that _two_ lives."

"Dear sweet God," he said reverently, but though he tossed the cherry light into the back seat his foot did come down just a little bit harder on the accelerator. "This is the place," he said at last as they pulled in sight of 1101 Prospect Gardens, the imposing apartment building with a hinky reputation. It _looked_ haunted, from the outside, but Marlowe couldn't care less if it played host to a legion of restless spirits. They could be no more restless than she was right at this moment, and somewhere in that building awaited the double bed that was the key to her salvation. If there'd been a bit in her mouth she probably would have snapped it in half with anxious champing as he pulled the Fusion into the dark parking garage next door and wound slowly up the concrete ramp to his reserved spot.

He parked the car and turned off the ignition but instead of fumbling to unbuckle his seatbelt like she was doing, he just sat there. His face was a grimace of pain.

"Carlton, what's wrong?" she asked, suddenly afraid that his joke about his life depending on getting here fast was all too serious. "Is it your heart?"

"What? Oh, no. No, Marlowe, I'm fine, I just…every time I'm in this damned garage I get a splitting headache. The new building manager is supposed to be checking for carbon monoxide leaks and such but he doesn't seem inclined to swift action."

She ran a hand through his hair. "Poor baby. Come on, I know just the thing to cure you of all aches and pains."

He grinned, though he still looked drawn and maybe just a little bit haunted himself. "I just bet you do."

She grinned back and fumbled for the door handle. "Nah ah ah," he said, and stopped her. He got out of the car and came around to the passenger side. He opened the door for her and held out his hand to help her out. The gesture was ridiculous and courtly and incredibly touching. It made her feel like a princess or a movie star despite the plain, ugly prison-issue street clothes she wore. He folded her arm through his and led her to the elevator. When the doors closed behind them she leaned in close and whispered in his ear. "Is there a security camera in here, do you think?"

"More than likely," he whispered back.

"Damn."

"Why?" he asked with a half-chuckle. "What would you do if there wasn't?"

"Something that would make Paris Hilton look like a rank amateur."

"Crap on a cracker," he exhaled, and punched the button for the ground floor again, as though that would speed their decent. She giggled and hugged his arm tightly. She felt lightheaded and a little bit dizzy, and she didn't think carbon monoxide was the culprit.

When the doors opened and expelled them onto the ground level she had to trot to keep up with his long-legged pace as he made a break for the front doors of the towering apartment complex. Another too-long elevator ride to the fifth floor while she glared around, looking for the hidden camera, and finally the doors opened on heaven, or at least the hallway that led to the corner condominium where heaven awaited. He fumbled with the keys a moment too long. The next door over opened and a small family - man, child on plastic Big Wheel tricycle, and heavily-pregnant woman - stepped out.

"Howdy, neighbor," the man said brightly. "Nice day, isn't it? Who's your new lady friend?"

"Oh. Hey. Hi," Carlton said, through teeth gritted in a rather unpleasant facsimile of a smile. "Uh, Eddie…Rose Marie…this is my girlfriend Marlowe Viccellio. She's moving in with me. Marlowe, these are the Farrows, Ed, Rose Marie, and their son Tony."

"Nice to meet you," Marlowe said, though she was no happier than Carlton to be stalled on the threshold.

Rose Marie Farrow gave her a quick once-over. "Welcome to the building, Marlowe," she said. Her lip was curled in a way that said she saw something faintly hilarious but was too polite to laugh. "That's an _interesting_ outfit you're wearing."

"Isn't it just?" Marlowe said brightly. "It's what they give you to wear when they let you out of prison."

She heard Carlton's strangled whoop of laughter. He managed at last to finesse the key into the lock and popped the door open. "So hate to cut the introductions short, but it's been a long fourteen months and we're anxious to get settled in," he said. "See you 'round, neighbors." He pulled her inside and slammed the door shut behind them.

"Jiminy Christmas eating a cracker," he said. He leaned against the door as though to barricade it. "I swear, _those people _have uncanny timing."

"What was the deal with the kid?" Marlowe asked. "He looked…_deranged."_

"He's definitely got problems," Carlton said seriously. "Exactly what those problems entail, apart from a tricycle obsession and a nervous tick with his finger, I don't know. And I swear, _she's_ been nine months pregnant the whole four months I've lived here. Either we're looking at a perma-preggers situation here or she's going to drop freakin' octuplets, and if that happens I say screw the lease, we're finding someplace else to live."

Marlowe giggled. "Maybe it's one of those prosthetic baby bellies. Maybe she's just trying to use the 'expectant mother' parking spaces at the grocery store."

He smiled. "Well. You're home now. What do you think? I had the place repainted and all, but anything you don't care for just let me know and we'll fix it up the way _you_ like it."

She looked around herself appreciatively at the condo with its understated palette of beiges and earth tones, warm and inviting and masculine. His sense of style had surprised her at his original condo, too - yes, there was a certain emphasis on weaponry in the art and design of the place, but the overall effect was considerably more _Martha Stewart Living _than _Guns & Ammo_, even with the hand grenade-shaped candles on the dinner table. "I wouldn't change a thing," she said. "It's perfect. _You're_ perfect." She stepped up to him and slid her hands beneath the lapels of his jacket across the expanse of his chest and shoulders.

"I'm crazy about you," he said, taking her in his arms. "I felt like I was losing my mind, waiting for you. But I would have waited 'til the end of time, if that's what it took."

"The wait is over," she breathed against his neck. "This is _our _time, now."

"Oh God, Marlowe…" He buried his hands in her hair and kissed her with all the pent-up passion he'd held in reserve for fourteen grueling months. She fumbled with the buttons of his shirt and unbuckled his belt. And then someone knocked at the door.

"_Crap," _Carlton moaned raggedly. He threw open the door with a snarl.

A tall, slightly portly gray-haired balding man stood framed by the jamb, a friendly, rather manic smile on his face that did not falter even a trifle in the full glare of Carlton's ferocious greeting. "Detective Lassiter! Shawn told me you brought your young lady-friend home from the 'joint' this afternoon, so I thought I'd stop by with a little housewarming present for the lucky girl."

"God, Woody, not one of your balloon animal-organs," Carlton growled.

"No, something even better. A perfectly preserved _Mustela nigripes _under glass." He brought the dead ferret in its glass dome out from behind his back and handed it to Marlowe. "Enjoy, dear lady."

"Oh, how cute. Thank you," she said. Carlton could only gaze in wonder at her. "I'm Marlowe Viccellio, as I guess you already knew. You are…?"

"Doctor Woodrow Strode, at your service, madam," Woody said grandly, and bowed over the hand she offered him. "I'm the county coroner so I work with Detective Lassiter quite often. And I just want to assure you that what happened between him and me was a complete accident, an aberration, and in no way a threat to your relationship. I am certain you'll be very happy together."

Marlowe blinked three times rapidly. "What…happened…?"

"Thanks for the dead rat, Woody, but you've really got to go now," Carlton said firmly. "Take care now. Bye bye. _See you in the morgue." _He slammed the door firmly.

"Carlton, what did he mean, 'what happened between you?'" Marlowe asked in bemusement.

"Woody is a first-class shit-bird whackaloon," he said. "You can't listen to anything he says. Now…where were we?"

She grinned and stepped back up to him. "Right here…" She pushed open his unbuttoned shirt and ran her fingers through the springy hair on his stomach and chest and nuzzled him while his hands stroked along her spine. And then someone knocked at the door.

"Son of a _bitch," _he snarled. _"Whaddaya want?"_

A pineapple wrapped in a huge pink ribbon briefly obscured two faces pressed close together behind it. The offering dropped a few inches to reveal Shawn Spencer and Burton Guster, who burst into song. "We welcome Marlowe from the clink, it doesn't matter what we think. A week or two of Lassie fun, and she'll go back for Murder One."

Carlton drew his pistol. The men shrieked, tossed the pineapple in Marlowe's general direction, and fled screaming for the elevator. She tried not to laugh - it _was_ funny, of course, or would be except for Carlton's beleaguered expression as he slammed the door. She put the pineapple on the end table next to the ferret under glass and wrapped her arms around his neck again. He was shaking, probably with the effort of not committing double homicide. She made comforting cooing noises to him to calm him down. Slowly his nervous trembling subsided and he began to respond to her gentle ministrations. A few sweet, lingering kisses and they were just about back to where they were before. And then someone knocked at the door.

"Ignore it," he growled, as though she'd made any move to answer it. Whoever it was knocked again, louder this time, and called out. _"Lassiter?" _- a sternly authoritative woman's voice.

"Chief Vick," Carlton whimpered into Marlowe's mouth. With the same heartbreaking expression as a whipped puppy, he broke away and opened the door.

Chief Karen Vick held a bottle of red wine. She stood next to Juliet O'Hara, who held a bouquet of summer flowers. Behind the two women stood Henry Spencer, carrying a six pack of _Dos Equis _beer. "Hello, Carlton," Vick said. "We won't stay. We just thought we'd stop by to welcome Ms. Viccellio."

"We passed Shawn and Gus on the way up," Henry said. "By the looks of them, Gus is probably glad he wore dark pants today. Did you draw on 'em?"

"They deserved it," Carlton said defensively.

"_Carlton," _O'Hara sighed.

"_They did," _he repeated.

"Knowing them, they probably did," Henry said.

"Oh, here," Vick said, and thrust the wine into Carlton's hands. "A little welcome-home present for both of you."

"And these are from me," Juliet said, presenting the flowers to Marlowe. "So glad to meet you under better circumstances than last time, Marlowe."

"Last time being the time you put me under arrest," Marlowe pointed out.

"Technically Carlton arrested you," Juliet said, with a nervous chuckle. "I just took you to the station for booking."

"_You're _the arresting officer in my records, O'Hara," Vick said.

Henry handed over the beer. "Here. A couple of these and no one will care who arrested who anymore. Now why don't we get out of here and let these two lovebirds get back to business?"

The two women seemed to notice Lassiter's disheveled, unbuttoned, unbuckled state for the first time at the same time. "Oh. Yes. Er…nice to meet you, Ms. Viccellio. Goodbye," Chief Vick said. The trio turned away and walked rather quickly toward the elevators. Carlton didn't close the door immediately. Instead he stood in the doorway and stared down the hall after them.

"What are you doing?" Marlowe asked.

"Waiting to see who else pops by," Lassiter said miserably. "I expect there'll be someone. McNab. Miller. Dobson. My Mother and Althea. Olympia freakin' Dukakis. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir."

She looked at him. She thought in that moment he looked a lot like the pit bull her brother Adrian had kept for some years when they were younger. A good dog, and long-suffering, but occasionally provoked past his endurance by the cheeky squirrels that chittered maddeningly at him and stole from his food dish. The strained, half-desperate, half-crazed expression on Carlton's face was nearly identical to the look Butch would wear when once again the fuzzy bandits scored his food and raced out of reach up a tree to pelt him with acorns, adding insult to injury.

"Come inside, baby, and lock the door," she said, with a tug at his hand. "Anyone else that drops in can stand outside and wait while I make sweet love to you. They can wait all damned night, if that's what it takes. And I think it will."


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

**WARNING: **Headed quite seriously into some M+ territory here.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Two: I Wouldn't Say No to a Sloppy Joe<strong>

It was still only early evening when they fell into bed at last, and since neither of them had had much appetite for lunch, eventually hunger drove them to postpone further…events…in favor of a little protein. "Feel up to that dinner out?" Lassiter asked.

"Only if you know a place we can go where they won't mind that I'm wearing nothing but your pajama top," Marlowe said, smiling.

"Well, there's the drive through at In & Out Burger," Lassiter said. "And there's a Subway restaurant in Walmart - that store is used to seeing people who are 'dressed down.'"

"How about I just make us some dinner?" she said.

"I can cook," Lassiter said defensively. "I'm pretty good at it, actually."

"Carlton, I haven't been allowed to cook for fourteen months." She looked at him and read his nervous expression. "What, are you worried I'm a bad cook? I'm a _good_ cook. Italian, you know. It's genetic. As long as you're not allergic to tomatoes. You're not, I trust?"

He shook his head. "Just mint."

"Yikes. Does that include basil and oregano? Because we might have a problem if so. I don't think I know a recipe that doesn't require them."

"No, just the peppermint and spearmint type of mint," he said. "And catnip, oddly enough."

"I'll keep that in mind. So what _is _the problem, then? Are you afraid to let me see the inside of your refrigerator?"

"A little," he muttered.

"Oh come on, it can't be that bad. I know you've been a bachelor for awhile now, I'm not expecting much." She threw open the door of the silver side-by-side Amana and stared. "Wow. Alphabetized _and _color-coded." She opened the vegetable crisper. "Your tomatoes look like a military review."

He was blushing furiously. "I've been working on it."

"Working on it?" She closed the refrigerator and turned to him. She saw his embarrassment and smiled. "Carlton. You're _organized_. It's sexy."

"I'm _anal, _and it's annoying," he said. "I've been trying to loosen up, honestly. I keep my spaghetti strainer next to my crock pot now, so…that's progress."

"Oo, that sounds dangerous. You're not afraid they'll produce strange hybrid slow-cook children with leaky bottoms?"

"Tease the man with the psychological disorder."

"Oh sweetie, I'm sorry," she said. She looked stricken. He laughed.

"Relax, I'm teasing _you._ The kitchen is by far the worst symptom. I'm not _As Good As It Gets _over here. Not quite."

She started opening cupboards and drawers. "Guess I'd better start learning your system or we're going to end up fighting every time I wash the dishes."

"No we won't," he said quickly. "You can put things wherever you think they should go. I'm fine with that."

She looked over her shoulder at him, one eyebrow raised skeptically. "Are you _sure _about that? Because my pizza cutter always had a habit of migrating from drawer to drawer so that I never found it in the same place twice."

He swallowed hard. "I'm sure."

She laughed and came over to where he stood and put her arms around his neck. "I'll learn your system," she said firmly. "I could stand to be more organized, and it's nice to know that your utensils are always going to be ready to hand. _Speaking of…"_

Her hand slipped beneath the waistband of his pajama pants and he jumped. She laughed at him and buried her face in his chest. "You are wound so tight, I'm surprised you don't tick when you walk, like a tin soldier."

"I know," he said dismally. "I'm sorry."

She picked her head up and looked at him, stunned at his tone. "Carlton…why are you apologizing? It's not your fault, and believe me, I'm going to have a _lot_ of fun helping you relax. And you're going to have a lot of fun _relaxing_, too."

Chin on his sternum, she smiled lasciviously up at him and gave that particularly sensitive portion of his anatomy beneath the blue plaid flannel of his pajama bottoms a gentle squeeze. His breathing grew ragged.

"Weren't we going to get ourselves something to eat?" he said. His voice was thick and hoarse.

"Well, you stand there and think about what you'd like," she said, "while I eat what _I_ want to."

She kissed the middle of his chest and then slid down his body, pulling his pajama bottoms down with her. When her lips came into contact with him his entire body jerked away violently.

"Easy, big fella," she said. "You don't like that?"

"L-_like_ it?" he repeated. "It's not that I don't l-like it, baby, I j-just…I don't know the e-etiquette." He blushed beet red from navel to brow.

"The etiquette?" she said blankly. Then comprehension dawned. "Do you mean you…don't know how this works? You've never…_experienced_ this before?" He blushed redder and cast his eyes down, face averted from where she knelt before him. "I don't quite understand, sweetie. I mean…you weren't at all afraid to do this for _me."_

He scratched the back of his neck. "That's different, Marlowe, I…I mean, I know how it works, _that_ way. _This_…I mean, I don't know what I'm supposed to do - or _not_ do - at all."

"Well, I can't say I know a whole lot about it myself," she admitted, "but I think we can probably figure it out if you want to give it a try."

She could tell, as much by the way his eyebrow twitched as the way his already erect penis grew still more engorged, that he really _did_ want to try, but she wasn't at all surprised when he said, "That's okay, sweetheart. There are a lot of other things I'd rather do for you."

_I'd rather do for you._ Marlowe didn't know much about the former _Mrs. _Carlton Lassiter, but she was beginning to get a possibly unfair picture of her as a rampageously selfish bitch. Carlton could easily have been just as shy about letting _her _do things that were more specifically for his pleasure, it didn't have to be that she was the one to _make_ him shy. But apparently Victoria Parker-Lassiter hadn't successfully managed at any point to teach Carlton about the mutual joys of reciprocation, and Marlowe was determined that _she_ would.

"I'd really _like_ to do this, Carlton," she said seriously. "Just relax. We'll figure out how this works, together."

She put one hand on his thigh and wrapped the other around his erection. She kept her eyes fixed on his face. He was still having trouble looking directly at her, but at least he didn't resist. She watched his reactions as she slowly coaxed his nervous nature to give in and enjoy the experience. He did not surrender easily, not that she'd expected it of him. Her major victory was when he finally, tentatively, placed a trembling hand very lightly on her hair and stroked the golden locks with just his thumb. So controlled, always - even when they made love and passion made him fierce, masterful, always she could feel the tight rein of control he kept on himself, keeping him gentle even at his wildest, and she had discovered he could be quite wild indeed. He'd gone to great lengths for her that day to make up for fourteen months of frustrating separation, and it made her happy to give back.

"Marlowe, baby, stop," he said at last, and a quick check of his heaving chest and the sweat streaming down his face told her he was close to losing control. A bit reluctantly, she backed away. He reached his long arms down to her and picked her bodily off the floor. He wrapped her in a powerful hug and kissed her, and he backed her up to the island counter and sat her down on top of it. "God, I love you," he gasped out when he finally came up for air.

She placed a trembling hand on his cheek. "I love you, too, Carlton," she said. He kissed her again, but then his eyes widened in alarm.

"Marlowe, you - you're _crying."_

"Am I?" She wiped her streaming eyes.

"Yes, you are. Are you okay? Did I hurt you?" The naked terror in his voice was almost heart-breaking.

"No, Carlton, you didn't hurt me, and I am _so much more _than okay. I'm happier than I've ever been in my entire life, and it's all thanks to you." She wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him tightly. Her tears came more freely and she laughed and kissed him all over his face.

Kisses turned into petting, and petting evolved into love-making. Once passion was finally sated they at last turned serious attention to the abatement of a different kind of hunger. A package of boneless skinless chicken breast filets from the freezer went into the microwave to defrost and Marlowe investigated the contents of the pantry. She found a can of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup and a vegetable bin of baking potatoes. Two of Idaho's finest went into the oven and two freshly thawed chicken breasts went into a frying pan, and once they were well cooked she opened the can of soup and poured the contents over them.

"There we go, fried chicken a la Viccellio and baked potato," she said, and set the two plates out on the dining room table.

"Looks a heck of a lot better than my mom's fried chicken," Lassiter said. "She always has to roll the meat in about twenty pounds of flour first."

"I don't mind a little breading now and then," Marlowe admitted, "but I put parmesan cheese in mine. And some herbs. But I didn't think either of us had the energy for anything other than simple tonight, late as it's getting. What time do you have to go to work tomorrow?"

He blinked. "Oh. I forgot to tell you, didn't I? I took the rest of the week off. I don't have to go back 'til Monday."

She grinned. "You took time off? For me?"

He smiled back. "Well, yeah. For _us."_

"Oh, you are so sweet."

Another round of kisses threatened to sidetrack dinner. Lassiter managed to control himself long enough to pull a bottle of Jameson's out of the liquor cabinet. He shook it slightly. "Want some?"

"You know it."

He poured two shots and set the bottle down on the table between them. Dinner was a quiet affair, because both of them were of the mindset that every minute of every day did _not_ have to be filled with conversation. They sat close together at the table and the silence was anything but unsociable. When the meal was finished Lassiter put his arm around her shoulders and nuzzled her ear.

"That was delicious," he said in a whisper. "Nearly as delicious as you are."

She giggled as his breath tickled the cup of her ear. "I'd better start cleaning up."

"You sit," he commanded. "I'll handle the dishes. You cooked the meal, after all."

"Sure, sure. You just don't want me to mess up your cabinets," she teased.

"I tell you what, if you think that's true, then _you_ can put the dishes away after I get 'em washed."

"Deal."

Marlowe grabbed the dishcloth and Lassiter ran a sink full of soapy water. The simple act of washing and drying dishes was complicated somewhat by gentle horseplay, culminating in Marlowe grabbing the sprayer head and giving Lassiter a soaking until he cried uncle. When she finally put the water-weapon down he grabbed her up and gave her a rough hug and kiss, transferring a good deal of water onto her. And then, somebody knocked.

Marlowe looked herself over and compared her damp knee-length pajama top to Lassiter's wet chest hair and soaked bottoms. "I'll get it," she said.

"Tell whoever it is to go away," Lassiter said crossly. "I don't care if there's been a mass shooting on State Street, I'm not going to work."

"Wouldn't they just call you for that?" Marlowe asked, eyebrow raised.

His face flushed. "Well I, uh…I might have _accidentally_ forgotten to charge my cell phone," he said, "and I think maybe I might have knocked the land line off the hook at some point."

Another knock, no more imperative than the first. "I would think if this was work-related it would sound a little more 'open me, dammit,'" Marlowe said. "Don't worry, I won't let whoever it is take up too much of our precious alone time."

She started to walk away. "Marlowe," he called. She turned. "Don't you think you're a little underdressed for answering the door?"

She grinned. "Well, given that what I _want_ to do, run through the streets naked shouting to the world how magnificent you are, would be a blatant violation of the terms of my parole, I don't think answering the door in a your very _demure_ sleep shirt is an inappropriate statement of possession," she said with a wink. Lassiter turned back to the last of the dishes, apparently to hide his blush and grin. With the condo's open floor plan, he could hear quite well from the kitchen even if he could not be seen from the door.

"Oh. Hello, Miss Viccellio," he heard. "I'm Buzz McNab, I'm an officer with the SBPD. I work under Detective Lassiter. We…er…we sort-of met, once, awhile ago…but we were never properly introduced."

"Hello, Officer McNab. Yes, I think I remember you," Marlowe said, a little bit sourly since the occasion McNab spoke of resulted in her incarceration and she did not care to be reminded of that night. "I hope you're not here to call Carlton in to work, because he more or less told me to say that he would be forced to _accidentally_ murder anyone who tried that." Lassiter grinned at the editorial comment. He had said nothing of the kind, of course, but he _would_ have, and Marlowe well knew it.

"Oh, no, Ma'am, I'm here on my own time. Er…is Detective Lassiter available? I think he'd want to be part of this, especially since I don't really know his feelings on the matter."

"On _what_ matter?" Marlowe asked. Lassiter thought that was a very good question. He came out of the kitchen wiping his hands on the dishcloth.

"What's up, McNab?" he growled.

"Ah, good evening, sir. Well, you see, my wife Francie works at an office complex with a bunch of other ladies, and one of them is moving to a new apartment where pets are strictly forbidden. Francie said she'd try and find her cat a new home, and she and I thought that maybe Miss Viccellio would like to keep him. He's a real sweetheart, and he'd be good company during those long hours you're stuck at work, Sir." The gangly young officer picked up the blue pet taxi he'd brought with him and opened the door. A fluffy black head poked out and curious yellow-green eyes regarded the condo and its occupants. "His name is Tuxedo Joe, and he's a Maine Coon like our Boy Cat."

"Oh, he's so cute," Marlowe gushed. She reached out and the cat leaped into her arms and stretched up to sniff her face. Lassiter felt like the first shot had been fired in a war he was destined to lose. He did not, under general circumstances, care for cats, and not _just _because he was allergic to their favorite mildly narcotic treat.

He looked the cat over. A remarkably huge beast, and long-haired, which probably meant his furniture would be completely covered in black fur before much time passed. It was not, exactly, a tuxedo cat - it was almost entirely black except for a tiny white patch on its chest and a larger patch on its underbelly by its back legs, and its bottle-brush tail looked long enough and strong enough to cause its own unique brand of mayhem. Then he looked at Marlowe's idyllic expression as she cooed to the animal. If the damned cat made her happy, kept her company during the undoubtedly long hours he would be away, kept her _with_ him despite his work and his idiosyncrasies…well, for that he'd deck the damn thing out in a diamond-studded collar.

"He'll need a cat box and food," he said.

"I brought all his supplies with me, just in case," McNab said eagerly. He produced a covered litter box and a bag full of accoutrements as well as a small bag of Iams cat food from the hall by the door. "He's got his own dishes and a brush, claw-clippers, some small toys, and a scratching pad. He's very gentle and as long as he's got his scratching pad he leaves the furniture alone. Oh, and there's a little bag of catnip in there, too, for a treat."

"Why don't you take the catnip, Officer McNab, for your cat?" Marlowe said sweetly. "Carlton is allergic to it. Are any of his toys infused with it?"

"Oh gosh, I'm sorry. I didn't know that," Buzz said anxiously. He dug in the plastic bag until he came up with the little sandwich bag of dried catnip and what looked like a gooey green ball composed of pressed herb. "This is the only catnip toy he's got. The other things are a friction-motor mouse, a laser pointer, and a feather on a fishing pole. Honestly, though, his favorite toys are boxes, the smaller the better. You should have seen him squeeze himself into the box my new electric razor came in."

Marlowe looked at Lassiter. "Well?" she asked.

"_Well_…do you want him?" he asked back.

"He's awfully cute…"

"If you like him, he's yours."

"Are you sure? Because I kind of pegged you for a dog person."

"I am, kind of," Lassiter admitted, "but you can't have a dog up here - not a _real_ dog, anyway, which is to say, anything over the size of a Shi Tzu. And this cat's roughly the size of a rottweiler, so that strikes me as the next best thing. Besides, if you like him, I like him," he added, only a trifle disingenuously.

"I like him," Marlowe said, and buried her face in the cat's ruffled neck fur.

"Well, McNab, you can tell your wife to tell her colleague that Tuxedo Joe has a new home," Lassiter said.

"Great!" the big man beamed. "I'm so glad. You're going to like him, Detective Lassiter, I promise. He's very dog-like in a lot of ways. Oh…but…uh…just so you don't get a nasty surprise…I recommend making sure he's not in the room when you take a bath or shower."

Lassiter's eyebrow elevated so alarmingly that McNab turned beet red and began to stammer like a nervous suspect. "H-h-he r-really l-likes to play in w-w-water," he explained.

An eighty-pound cat that likes to swim. Novel.

"Well, I'd better get home. It was nice meeting you, er…properly, Miss Viccellio," McNab said, with a wary eye at her damp and scanty attire. Then he nodded at his commanding officer. "Detective Lassiter."

"Goodbye, McNab," Lassiter said. He closed the door firmly but silently in the young policeman's face. He turned back into the condo. Marlowe was still snuggling the cat, cooing gibberish into its fur. "That thing is bigger than you are."

"Oh, he's all fur," she said, but she put the animal down in clear relief of the weight. The cat stropped itself against her bare legs, making her giggle. With its tail sticking straight up like a flagpole the beast was nearly three feet tall. "I'm going to set up his dishes in the kitchen. Where do you think the box should go?"

_Outside_, he thought, but out loud he said, "Wherever you think is best."

"Well, its got to be someplace a little bit out of the way or every time he makes a smelly we're going to gag," she said decisively. "My old roommate's cat could clear the whole house and he kept the box right by his bedroom door, it was awful." She eyed the condo's layout critically. Finally she settled on the far corner of the entrance foyer. "Not ideal, but given the open floor plan there aren't a lot of places to put it. At least it's as far from the kitchen and dining room as possible, and he can get to it whenever he needs it."

She put the bag of toys inside the blue pet taxi and put the taxi on the top shelf of the coat closet. Then she pulled it down again and pulled the cat fisher toy out and handed it to Lassiter. "Why don't you see if he'll play with you?" she said, as though teasing a monster cat with a feather on a stick was at the top of his Bucket List. Obedient to the last, Lassiter halfheartedly dangled the gaily colored feather in front of the cat's black nose. The animal did not leap and frisk like the cats in a Purina commercial. Instead the beast reared up on its back legs and looked at the feather with wide eyes, tapped at it once or twice with a tufted left paw that looked about the size of Lassiter's own palm, then dropped back down onto all fours and looked up at the detective with its head cocked to one side, as if to say, "Well, that's nice. What else have you got?"

Marlowe did not pay attention. She put the cardboard scratching pad on the living room floor behind the loveseat and the pet dishes on the kitchen floor next to the one wall not set with cabinets. She filled the water dish at the sink and poured a generous helping of dry kibble into the food bowl. At the sound the cat abandoned Lassiter and his ridiculous toy and shot into the kitchen with all the grace and majesty of a rhinoceros at full charge - impressive, but not exactly catlike.

"Oh, you're hungry, aren't you?" Marlowe said. "Wow, you are one messy eater! You're a piggy! Yes, you are! I'm going to call you Sloppy Joe, because you're such a sloppy eater!"

The only response Lassiter heard was the loud, bone-like crunching of kibble in kitty jaws.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

**A/N: **Evidently Lassiter and I both forgot about Juliet's gift of summer flowers. Oh well. Since they didn't come from him they would not have been an appropriate sentiment with the breakfast anyway, in his view.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Three: Headache Waiting to Happen<strong>

Lassiter awoke in the morning to two strange sensations, one of them wonderful, the other…not so much. The first, wonderful sensation was waking up next to a beautiful woman who was smiling and snuggling against him in her sleep, and the second, not-so-wonderful sensation was the heavy weight of the cat curled up in the middle of his back as he lay face-down in the pillow. There was a third sensation, a pounding headache originating behind his left eye, but that at least was a fairly typical occurrence. He lay perfectly still and waited for the pain, and the concomitant bright flashes of meaningless images, to fade.

A hand touched his cheek. "Baby, are you okay?"

"I will be if you can get the fuzzy bowling ball off my spine," he mumbled into the pillow. Marlowe giggled and shooed the cat away. He refused to be shooed and got down slowly, showing that it was all his idea. Lassiter heaved a deep sigh. "Thanks, hon."

Marlowe's hand kept stroking his cheek and brow, as though she sensed he was in pain. "Is it a headache?" she asked in a whisper.

"Yeah."

"Do these…happen frequently?"

"All the time."

"Should I shut up so you can rest?"

He picked his face out of the pillow and looked at her. "No, it's okay. They pass pretty quickly most of the time. When I was a kid they'd knock me out all day."

"You've been having them since you were a kid? You've…been checked out, right? Medically?"

"They're just migraines, Marlowe. It's okay."

_"Carlton…"_

He grinned. "Is it strange that I think it's sexy you're concerned about my health? I've been checked out. Repeatedly."

Marlowe smiled in relief. "Good. Has the pain passed? You don't look so strained now."

"How could I be in pain when you've got your fingers in my hair? Twice as effective as acetaminophen and infinitely healthier for my liver."

Her smile broadened and she kissed him. He turned onto his side and wrapped his arms tight about her and she threw one leg over both of his. A leisurely session of early-morning love making and she drifted back into a light slumber, lips curled in what looked almost like a smug smile. Lassiter slipped out of her arms and out of bed. He padded into the bathroom to take care of the basic business of preparing for the day. Freshly showered and shaved, he stood in the bedroom door and just watched her for a moment, and then went to the kitchen, where he found the cat with its head buried in its food dish, powerful jaws crunching, crunching, crunching.

"You, sir, are incredibly lucky that Marlowe likes you," he informed the cat gravely as he set himself to the task of preparing breakfast. "For that matter, so's McNab. If she wasn't here, believe me, you'd be out on the street where you belong, and McNab would have my size twelve narrow up his high-pocket ass."

The cat crunched kibble solemnly, but it did swing its broad head around to watch him with its green-gold eyes, particularly when he pulled the carton of milk out of the refrigerator. Lassiter checked the expiration date, sniffed it, and shrugged. The cat twitched its tall, tufted ears as he poured the milk into a Pyrex measuring cup, but remained otherwise motionless.

"Don't even think about it," Lassiter warned. "My understanding is that cats shouldn't drink milk, as a general rule, and just between you and me? Any time you decide to chuck up on _my furniture_, pal, you'd better run and hide behind Marlowe." The cat yawned, an impressive nearly 180 degree gape, and sauntered away into the living room, belly swinging. Lassiter splashed the milk into the bowl of batter he was mixing up and put the carton away, and made a quick notation on the magnetic notepad on the side of the refrigerator in his chunky block script - _milk, eggs._

While he waited for the ding that would tell him the Waring waffle-iron needed to be turned, Lassiter turned his attention to his neatly kept but somewhat neglected refrigerator, looking for suspicious expiration dates. The milk was still okay but a few things, including a half-carton of orange juice, went into the trash. That was okay, he had six fresh oranges in a bowl near the window and a juicer in the cabinet, but he made a note on the grocery list just the same. The bell rang and he flipped the waffle iron over, and turned his attention to the freezer while the other side cooked. He found the box containing the other half of a Stauffer's frozen lasagna he'd sawed in half for his dinner a couple of nights' previous. He was not, under ordinary circumstances, a willfully wasteful person, particularly where food was concerned, but it was with a certain sense of malicious glee that he tossed the heavy pasta brick into the black trash bag. There would almost undoubtedly be times in his future when he would eat his dinner alone, but he intended to see to it that he'd never again eat another lonely, pathetic dinner.

He finished up the waffles and fried up a half a pound of bacon and scrambled a couple of eggs. He put the plates together on a couple of nice TV trays and filled two glasses with fresh-squeezed orange juice. It looked nice, but he wished he had flowers, even just a daisy, to offset the practicality with a little romance. He hadn't even thought to bring her any when he picked her up from the prison. This…_this_ was why he couldn't keep a relationship. He had no sense of the right way to do things.

He took the trays into the bedroom. "Knock knock," he said.

Marlowe stretched and smiled sleepily. "Breakfast in bed?"

"Yeah, I, uh…I hope you like waffles."

"Love 'em. Do I smell bacon?"

"And eggs. Scrambled, because that's the only way I can make 'em where they don't turn out looking faintly sickly."

"My favorite. Well. He's a fantastic lover _and_ he cooks for me. I think I won the relationship jackpot."

"I was just thinking _I _had," Lassiter said with a grin. He handed her one tray and sat himself carefully on the edge of the bed with his own. He hesitated over his meal with fork held loosely in hand, watching her eat. "There should be flowers," he sighed at last. "I'm sorry there's no flowers. I was so excited to bring you home, I forgot all _about_ flowers."

She laughed. "I find no fault with the fact that there are no flowers," she said. "There are much better ways to show a woman how much you love her, and you demonstrated most of those last night and this morning already. Relax, Carlton, you're doing it right."

He let out a ragged breath. "I hope so," he said. "You've got an appointment with your PO this morning, right?"

"Nine forty-five."

"Shopping spree after that, and catch lunch in town?" he suggested. "I definitely want to get you hooked up with a new cell phone, at the very least."

"Sounds good to me," she smiled. Crisp bacon crackled in her fingers as she took a bite. "You _are _a good cook."

"Well, adequate," he confessed, "and my cuisine is a little limited. If you're fond of corned beef and cabbage I've got you covered, but I'm not sure I've got the courage to tackle a béarnaise sauce."

"I bet you do," she said. "I don't believe you're afraid of _anything, _Mr. Fries-Bacon-Without-a-Shirt."

He was scared to death of _her, _but not for any reason he was likely to cop to. He swallowed the hard, dry lump in his throat at the reminder of just how much he had riding on this relationship and turned his attention to his own breakfast, though in truth he had no real appetite. When she finished Marlowe climbed out of bed and went to take a shower, and Lassiter gathered up the breakfast dishes and went back to the kitchen to clean up, squelching the impulse to join her. Once the dishes were clean he went back to the bedroom to dress. Marlowe was sitting on the edge of the bed, dressed in his bathrobe, drying her hair with a towel. She smiled at him as he pulled socks and pants out of the dresser.

"Do I have any clean clothes or do I have to borrow some of yours?" she asked. "Personally I think I'd look adorable in a pair of your pants with the cuffs rolled up a mile and a half."

Lassiter privately agreed. "Your former roommates let me go over to your old place and get your things," he said. "Your clothes are hanging in the closet, and your socks and…things…are in the top drawer of the bureau. It will definitely make a better impression on your parole officer than wearing stuff six or seven sizes too big."

She grinned at him as she pulled bras out of the drawer. "What color should I wear?" she asked, slipping out of his robe and holding up a variety of lacy under things. "Black? White? Pink?"

"Does it matter?" he asked. "What kind of interview are you expecting to have with Officer…" he checked the appointment book on the bedside table "…Maria Chavez?"

"It's not for _her, _silly. I figure you're entitled to a hand in the decision-making since you're the one who's going to be taking it _off."_

He gulped. "I can't make a choice like that," he said. "You look equally hot in any of them, surpassed only by how hot you look out of them."

"Right answer," she said. "I guess for that we'll go with…_red." _She donned a pair of lace panties and matching pushup bra, a color hot enough to raise the room temperature twenty degrees.

"Good choice," he said weakly. "Now I think I'd better go do something constructive before you tease me into something we don't have time for and I don't have stamina for."

She laughed. "You've been doing damned good on the stamina issue so far. I'll be out in a minute."

He went into the living room, where he found the cat sitting on the loveseat in front of the silent television set, leaned back against the cushions with his forepaws folded on his curly-furred tummy. Lassiter stared at the cat for a moment, then leaned on the back of the sofa.

"Can I get you anything?" he asked. "The remote? A beer? A waistband to shove your paw down, Al Bundy-Cat?"

The cat swiveled its head around to look at him and chirped. _Chirped_, like a freaking nightingale. Lassiter backed away from the couch slowly. Massive, chirping cats that sit up like couch potatoes. He was starting to think life was less freaky back when that crazy chick was trying to kill him with drugged air conditioning. He got the garbage out of the kitchen and scooped the cat box clean, barely managing not to gag. He'd seen and smelled a lot of foul things in his capacity as head detective, but voluntarily subjecting himself to feces on his own time was a new and disturbing turn of events. Of course, he'd still have to deal with poop if he had a dog, but that was one of the reasons why he didn't _have_ a dog.

Marlowe came out of the bedroom as he was coming back from his trip to the hallway garbage chute. She looked both cute and professional in gray Capri pants, blue shell top, and short gray blazer, with her hair twisted into a neat chignon. And being privy to the fact that she was wearing cherry-red underwear beneath it all added an entirely different dimension to the look.

"You look fantastic," he said.

She smiled and shouldered her purse. "Wow, after all this time feels a little weird to carry this thing again," she said. "Okay. I'm ready. I'm scared shitless but I'm ready."

"Don't be scared. I'm much more terrifying than any probation officer, and you don't seem at all intimidated by _me."_

"Yeah, well, I'm _sleeping_ with you, which kind of blunts your fangs a bit," Marlowe said. "I don't think that technique would work on Officer Maria Chavez."

"Actually, I wouldn't be at all surprised if it would," Lassiter said. "But I would be very disturbed if you tried it."


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

**A/N: **The scene in the TJ Maxx was inspired by video of an actual occurrence in a convenience store where an off-duty officer (who was out of uniform but nevertheless could not have looked MORE like a cop) ended up barrel to barrel with a nervous would-be robber and managed to brass-ball him into submission, which was just too cool not to have happen to our favorite fictional detective.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Four: Like A Frickin' Magnet<strong>

Lassiter didn't go in with Marlowe when she saw her PO, though he was torn between the idea of showing support versus the idea that he was going to show himself up as clingy. He _was, _but burying her under his overprotective attentions wasn't going to make this relationship work. Just ask Victoria - her two main complaints at the end of the marriage were that he was smothering her _and_ ignoring her. He still had no idea how he managed to do both at once, which made him all the more uncertain in his new relationship. Marlowe needed space to be her own person but there had to be enough connection between them that she felt like part of an _us_, he'd figured that much out, but finding the line he should walk was difficult and nerve-wracking.

She came out of the office looking slightly paler than normal but otherwise composed. Lassiter hesitated only a fraction of a second before putting his arm around her shoulders, and the grateful smile she gave him in return told him he'd made the right choice about _that_, at least. "So, how'd it go?"

"Good. Better than I expected, actually. She wasn't the dragon I was expecting but I wish I'd had your hand to squeeze."

"Crap. I knew I should have gone in with you - I _wanted_ to, believe me, but I thought if Officer Chavez came off all 'tough love' like POs usually do then I'd start growling and you'd try and pretend you didn't know me…"

She laughed. "I might have, but actually she didn't go that line. She said she'd reviewed my offense and didn't see me as a high risk of repeating it, so she basically just introduced herself and wished me well, and gave me the list of dos and don'ts as mandated by the court of California, and told me that she probably wouldn't need to see me again for awhile as long as I stick to my call-in schedule."

"Thank God you got a PO with sense."

"So where to now?"

"Where do you want to go?" he asked. "The only thing I've planned out is getting you a cell, everything else is up to you. We can hit all your favorite stores."

She grinned. "Will you hold my purse while I'm in the dressing rooms trying on jeans?"

"That's what I'm here for," he said heroically, "holding the purse and handing over the platinum card."

"You should've worn the black engineer boots then," she said. "My purse will clash horribly with those tan bucks."

"I will look exactly like any number of uncomfortable husbands and boyfriends standing sentinel outside the ladies' dressing room." He opened the passenger door for her. "And it will be my honor to do so, my lady."

She climbed into the Fusion and smiled at him. "I'm so lucky to have a guy willing to martyr himself for me."

"Holding a purse is one thing. If you ask me to jump in front of a freight train or something I'll have to think about it."

"Not an outright refusal, then? I'll have to keep that in mind," she said, with a wink.

They spent the next couple of hours browsing various stores and Lassiter signed Marlowe up with a new smartphone, despite her objections to the cost of the model. "This provider gives the SBPD a discount on service," he explained, only a little afraid that he was showing her his cheap side, "so it evens out. Don't worry about it."

Marlowe checked the specifications on her new phone. "Why would anyone need to be able to watch a movie on their telephone?" she asked. "I don't know about you, but I've never been so bored that I felt the need to watch _Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen _on a screen the size of a recipe file card."

"I don't quite get that myself," Lassiter admitted. "Seems like every technological advance is custom designed to create classic instances of social Darwinism. I would say its just desserts except the stupid bastards who take themselves out are at least as likely to take someone else out with them who was guilty only of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just promise me you won't use it while driving and I don't care how many movies you watch or books you read on your telephone."

"I promise, never fear."

He kissed her cheek. "Thank you. You will probably catch me wigging out at regular intervals for awhile whenever we happen to be separated, but I promise I'll try to restrain my overprotective impulses."

She slipped her arm around his waist. "I don't mind a little excessive protectiveness," she said. "And given all the crap that's happened to _you_ lately I'll probably be wigging out fairly regularly while you're at work, so we're even on that score."

"What do you mean, all the crap that's happened to me lately?" Lassiter asked.

"We got our newspapers late but we always got them," Marlowe muttered.

"Pardon?"

"First a crazy chick tries to drug you to death in the new condo, and _then_ I find out you're involved in a high-speed t-bone accident and suffered a concussion and minor injuries…and of course you can't say _anything_ about any of it to your girlfriend during any of our visits. I probably wouldn't have known about the broken nose if _I_ hadn't been the one to give it to you."

"I didn't want you to worry," he said lamely.

"Yes, and of course I didn't worry _at all _after finding out all of this second-hand."

Lassiter's head dropped below his stooped shoulders. "I'm sorry," he said in a very small voice.

She laughed and squeezed him. "I forgive you - _this time," _she said, "but don't let it happen again. From here on out I should be the first person informed about these things."

"You will be," he said in his normal tones. "I changed my first contact information last week. And my beneficiary information, too, just so you know, but don't get excited, it's not exactly an impressive amount of insurance so there's really no point in pushing me off a cliff to get it."

"Depends on how aggravating you're being when we're near a handy precipice," she said. "And I mean that I need to hear from _you, _not Chief Vick."

"Well I know, dear, but there's always the possibility…"

She shuddered. "I know. I just don't want to think about that."

After that she directed him to a nearby department store. Ordinarily Lassiter was not an eager shopper, and he was never excited to walk through the doors of a TJ Maxx, not even when they had a sale on ties, but for some reason he caught himself walking in his fastest stride, with the same amped-up feeling he got whenever he approached an active crime scene. He stopped dead in front of the doors, long enough for Marlowe to catch him up.

"Woah, there, Legs," she panted, "I can't keep up with you when you walk like that."

"Are you sure you want to shop here?" he asked suddenly. "I mean, isn't there any place else you'd rather go?"

"Er…well, it's no big deal, but we're here now, aren't we?" Marlowe said. "What's up? You look a little spooked."

Spooked. A good term. A very good term, in fact, and so too was the term _Spook_, which had been his nickname in grade school for a good many years. He shoved his feelings aside and turned a rather sickly-looking smile on his girlfriend.

"Oh, nothing," he lied. "Come on, wasting time out here with me means you could be missing out on all those Maxxinista savings."

"Time with you is never wasted," Marlowe said, but she grabbed his arm and fairly dragged him through the automatic doors.

A quick scan of the interior and the placid customers turned up nothing amiss. Lassiter tried to ignore the pinging alarm bells in his head, but even after twenty uneventful minutes browsing the Missy section they remained insistent. Marlowe knew something was wrong with him, he should just tell her…but people always misconstrued this kind of thing. It was cop's instinct, honed to a razor's edge over his career, and nothing more. Sometimes it even came to nothing. This looked to be one of those times.

And then, as they were heading to the checkouts with the armful of jeans and tops and two pairs of shoes Marlowe picked out, the Perp walked in. Lassiter knew the man was a Perp the instant he saw him, mostly because of how wound the guy looked. He was pushing Marlowe to the floor even before the man drew the gun hidden beneath the baggy and weather-inappropriate sweatshirt he wore, and in the same motion he drew his own pistol. The guy just had time to start hollering for everyone to get on the floor before Lassiter's bellow drowned him out.

"_SBPD! Drop the weapon!"_

The barrel of the Perp's automatic swiveled around to point at him. There was an obvious disparity between the two of them that might well have foretold the ultimate outcome from the start - the Perp's gun wavered uncertainly while Lassiter's barrel was rock-steady. The robber's voice squeaked as he tried to take back control of the situation.

"You better drop that piece, Pig," he started to say, but Lassiter cut him off with a curt, _"Drop the weapon and get on the floor, now!"_

A few brief seconds that spun out for a short eternity passed while cold blue eyes remained locked unblinkingly on red-rimmed brown eyes, and then the would-be robber slowly placed his gun on the floor and kicked it away, raised his open-palmed hands over his head, and knelt down to lower himself to a prone position on the cool white linoleum.

Lassiter had forgotten that there were other people in the building, he was reminded only by the sudden explosion of applause. The nearest cashier, a pimple-faced young man who looked all of fifteen, said, "Dude, that was so totally epic." Lassiter ignored it all, secured his weapon and the robber's, and cuffed the man where he lay. He pulled out his police radio and called in to Dispatch for a uniformed officer.

"We're Code Four here, Dispatch, but I need transport for one subject."

"Roger that, Detective, I have an officer on route. Having a nice vacation?"

"Don't get funny, Dispatch. Lassiter, out."

Marlowe was dusting herself off. "Sweetie…how did you know that was going to happen?" she asked.

"Sorry, what?"

"You knew before we even walked through the doors that something was going to go down here today. How did you _do_ that?"

"I…don't know what you mean."

She merely looked at him, one eyebrow cocked. Lassiter blushed and shuffled his feet. "It's…just…cop instinct," he mumbled.

She nodded slowly. "First I heard of cop instinct kicking in twenty or thirty minutes in advance of _anything _untoward happening, but okay, we'll go with that."

_Shit, she thinks I set this up to make myself look heroic or something, _he thought. In actual fact, her suspicions were leading her in a different direction entirely.

_I think…Carlton might be psychic_, Marlowe thought.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Five: Out of the Bag<strong>

"Carlton, this is _not_ how you're supposed to be spending your vacation time."

Lassiter sighed and turned to face his partner, who stood in the same arms-crossed foot-tapping stance of irritation he remembered from his mother, grandmother, aunts, and almost all of his elementary school teachers. "O'Hara, what was I supposed to do? Just let the guy rob the place because I was officially 'off-duty?' Marlowe and I were shopping."

"Shopping. With your gun, cuffs, and police radio."

"Yeah. What?"

Juliet shook her head. "Carlton, Carlton, Carlton."

"What are you doing here, anyway, O'Hara? I only called in for transport."

"Yes, and when I heard on the police band that an off-duty detective had called in to report an attempted armed robbery and an arrest I knew exactly who that was."

"Well jeezly crow, O'Hara, you act like I planned this or something."

"I'm simply saying, Carlton, that you have an unfortunate knack for being in the wrong place at the right time that puts Shawn to shame."

"All these people who _didn't_ get robbed today don't think I was in the wrong place."

"I know, Carlton, but I really hoped you'd be able to take it easy for these few days and _relax," _Juliet said. "Now you're going to be stuck in processing for the next couple of hours instead of spending time with your girlfriend like you should be. You've just got…the most _rotten _luck."

A reporter bustled up and pulled Lassiter aside for a quick interview, and Marlowe approached his partner a bit warily. "Detective O'Hara," she said, with a nod.

"Hello, Ms. Viccellio," Juliet replied, at least as uncomfortably. "Sorry your day had to be interrupted like this. It really shouldn't take very long to get everything straightened out, Carlton just needs to file a report about the arrest and see our guy through processing. We may need a witness statement from you, but everything is pretty cut and dried in a case like this, and there's no shortage of eyewitnesses."

"Does this happen often?" Marlowe asked.

"A cop being in the right place at the right time?" Juliet said. "Once in awhile. More often than you'd expect, I think, but it's pretty rare."

"Does this happen to _Carlton _often?"

"Um…semi-regularly," Juliet admitted. "But then, he's always on high-alert."

"Does he ever strike you as being…a bit _precognitive_ about crime?" Marlowe ventured.

"Precognitive? Er…no, I don't think so. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, no reason," Marlowe hedged. "He seemed a little like he was expecting this to happen, is all."

"I think Carlton is _always_ expecting crime to happen, Marlowe," Juliet said with a smile. "He doesn't have a very high opinion of humanity in general. He certainly has a very high opinion of _you_, though."

"He talks about me?" Marlowe asked in surprise.

"More than anything else I've ever heard him talk about," Juliet said. "Not that he's a big talker in the first place, of course, but its so obvious how much he cares about you. He just…_lights up _whenever he says your name or someone mentions you. I just wanted to tell you how happy I am that he's found you - he's needed someone special in his life for a long time now."

Lassiter came back then. "Miller is going to take care of booking," he said. He sounded a bit weary and distracted now, not at all uncommon for him after even a positive run-in with the media. "I've still got to go to the station and fill out a report. It shouldn't take too long, but I'm sorry all the same."

Marlowe stretched up to land a quick kiss on his cheek. "It's okay, sweetie."

"I promise I'll make it up to you. I'll take you to _Mario's_ for dinner, unless there's someplace else you'd rather go."

"No, _Mario's_ sounds great. I love their bread."

He led her to the car, arm protectively circling her waist. The reporter, directing her photographer to get shots of the robber being led away by Officer Miller, apparently thought that her Page Six story might make it all the way to page three if a romantic angle could be involved and shoved her digital recorder in Marlowe's face.

Startled, Marlowe scarcely understood the woman's question, though she caught the words "heroic" and "boyfriend." "No comment," she said uncomfortably, and huddled closer to Lassiter's side.

"Leave the lady alone," Lassiter growled at the reporter. Undaunted, she shoved her recorder back into his face.

"Detective Lassiter, were you protecting your girlfriend?"

"I protect the _public_, as is my duty. Now if you'll excuse me, I've still got a lot of work to do."

He pulled Marlowe away from the media's clutches and saw her safely into the front of the Ford Fusion. "Do you think there's a chance they'll suss out who I am?" Marlowe asked once they had the privacy.

"If they're interested enough to look, I suppose they will. Does that bother you?"

"It will if you get into trouble for it."

He looked genuinely quizzical as he put the Fusion into gear. "Why would that get me into trouble?"

"Maybe you didn't get the memo, Head Detective," Marlowe said gently, trying to make it sound like a joke despite the cold lump of fear in her heart, "but your girlfriend is a _convicted criminal._ You're not afraid that might…reflect badly on you?"

He sighed. "I don't care what the media has to say about me anymore," he said. "A lesson I learned around about the time that the _Mirror_ started calling me 'Detective Dipstick.' The people that matter already know everything they need to know."

"But don't you think this will adversely affect your chances of career advancement?"

He sighed again. "I hope you weren't hanging any hopes on big promotions in my future. My career has, I fear, pretty much capped out."

"What? Now why would you say that?"

He gave a little sideways shrug of the head. "Well…over the years I've come to recognize the fact…unpalatable as it is…that I may have reached the limits of my potential."

"Hey, don't talk like that. You want to be Chief of Police? Keep working toward it. Although frankly I can't picture you being content with riding a desk and working administration ninety percent of your time. Maybe when you're old and gray and tired, but not now," she finished with a smile.

"Ha. I _am_ old and gray and tired. And the position isn't going to open up any time soon."

"Are you _dissatisfied_ with where you are in your career?" Marlowe asked cautiously.

He made that strange sideways head-shrug again. "I love my job," he said, perhaps a trifle dubiously, "but it used to be…better. Or maybe _I _used to be better, one or the other."

Marlowe watched him for a long moment. "What changed?" she asked.

"The divorce," he blurted instantly, though he looked uncomfortable to say the words aloud. "I went through a _lot_ of changes after Victoria kicked me out, and none of them were for the better. I don't know…I didn't lose my _drive, _if anything that only increased, I just…I kind of lost my perspective, I guess. And maybe my mind. Certainly my trust, and I never had much of that to begin with. I guess maybe now I'm slowly getting back what I lost, but…well, I've come to the conclusion I was probably never as good as I thought I was back then."

"Carlton, you can't think about yourself that way," Marlowe began. "You _make_ it true when you believe it."

"Yeah, well, you didn't know me back then. I was…a bit full of myself, I guess. Youngest head detective in department history, fast track to the top…back then I was dead sure I got where I was on merit, but…well, there was always talk that I got the job because of family connections."

"You come from a police background?" Marlowe asked, though the revelation didn't surprise her at all.

"My Aunt Carolyn was a detective with the Ventura precinct for years and years," Lassiter said reluctantly, "and my dad…well, he never made it out of uniform, but he was killed in the line of duty so there's that whole…department hero concept."

"Your father was killed," Marlowe repeated softly. "How old were you when _that _happened?"

"Er…well, he died about three months before my sister was born, so that means I was thirteen."

"Must have made it really hard for you."

Lassiter shrugged one shoulder. "It was hard to tell the difference, actually. He wasn't around much to begin with."

"That's too bad." Marlowe was silent for a few blocks. "How did it happen? If you don't mind talking about it, that is."

"My dad, you mean? Well, he got shot. I don't really know too much about it, actually, other than the fact that he was chasing a suspect and got ambushed uptown somewhere. In a parking garage. I barely even remember the funeral at this point, just the flag and the salute of arms, really."

He pulled the Fusion into his reserved spot outside the Santa Barbara Police Department. "Here we are. This shouldn't be too painful, but I could have wished for better circumstances," he said darkly, staring at something out front. Marlowe followed his gaze and saw a brilliantly blue Toyota Echo hatchback sitting like an overripe blueberry in a public parking space.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Spencer," Lassiter said simply, and got out to open her door for her.

"Gay Lestat, right?" Marlowe asked. "The one who hangs out with Count Chocula, the guy who came with you when I gave you the info I got from that gang chick."

"That's the asshole," Lassiter affirmed.

"What's his deal, anyway?" Marlowe asked. "Is he really psychic like he claimed?"

Lassiter rolled his eyes. "No."

"Then why do you guys use him so much?"

"He gets results, and people seem to like him," Lassiter said tersely.

"But you're not one of those people."

"Not…overmuch. He's not always entirely _completely_ annoying, but _usually…"_

Marlowe followed him into the building. "Do you need me to fill out a statement, or something?" she asked.

"I don't think so. Chief Vick may have other ideas, though, but it can wait even so. Will you be okay waiting for me in the hall? I could get someone to run you home if you'd rather."

"I'll be fine," Marlowe said brightly, and sat down on one of the benches in the main receiving hall with a smile for her man. "Go do your job, Detective."

He reached out and touched her hair. "I'll be as quick as possible."

"Take your time, sweetie. I'm not going anywhere."

"Not yet," she thought she heard him mumble before he turned and walked briskly into the Bullpen.

Marlowe sat patiently and waited, knowing she was likely to wait for a long time. Carlton was worth it, she felt, and while she thought it would be very nice to have a quiet dinner with him at _Mario's, _an upscale Italian restaurant with dim lighting, a pretentious wine list, and a complementary loaf of garlic bread at every very private table, what she _really _looked forward to was the return to the condo, where she could indulge the numerous sexual fantasies that had been playing through her head since she saw him staring into the cold cyclopean eye of a gun and watched it blink. _Go ahead, punk…make my day._

She couldn't see him from where she sat by the conference room wall because his desk was around the corner, but she saw the two figures who came to stand near the place where he'd disappeared. While both men were relatively short, there was little enough in common between them. One was trim and tucked-in, black and bald. The other was only rather swarthy, over-gelled, running slightly to pudge, and wore a dark blue shirt and a pair of jeans that made him look like an unmade bed. Marlowe recognized them both.

She listened, without meaning to, as they - by which she meant _he_, Spencer, he of the over-gelled hair and over-worn outfit - ragged Lassiter about working on his day off. It seemed innocent enough at first, but eventually Marlowe caught herself grinding her teeth, and she knew why she was risking her dental work. The gentle, comradely teasing had slowly taken on a much sharper edge, or perhaps she'd only heard enough of it at last to recognize the edge that had always been there. This Spencer, whatever he was to the police force, began to sound very much like a schoolyard bully.

She was surprised by just how many jibes Carlton left unanswered. He was snappish, of course, but it was a tight sort of snappishness, concealing what she thought was a well-controlled and utterly genuine _anger, _of the sort that might break out in violence if it were released. She tried to stay calm. Carlton was a grown man, and he didn't need her to get angry and indignant on his behalf.

Eventually the "psychic" seemed to tire of his playground games and he and his partner sauntered out of the Bullpen. "Hello, Marlowe," he greeted grandly as he swaggered into full view. "No handcuffs, I see. This must be a novel experience for you." Marlowe kept silent, her mouth tightening into a thin, grim line. His friend, "Gus," if Marlowe remembered correctly, nodded politely and made some attempt to pull Spencer away.

Shawn ignored him. "Of course, I suppose Lassie saves the handcuffs for the bedroom, right? Tell me, does he want you to wear the orange jumpsuit to bed?"

Marlowe looked him dead in the eye. "What happens in _my _bed will never be any of _your_ business," she said coldly.

Shawn grinned broadly. It made his face look even pudgier, and she wondered whether he was aware of that fact - she rather doubted it since he seemed the narcissistic sort, though she didn't see any particular reason for him to love himself so much. "That's too bad, really, because I could have helped you out. My girlfriend and I recently started reading the _Kama Sutra_, and believe me, that's some compelling literature right there. If you were a little more cooperative we could have worked together to fix Lassiepants's deficiencies."

"_Carlton _doesn't have any," Marlowe said, "but there seems to me to be something _severely_ deficient in a man who would jokeabout his relationship with his girlfriend, particularly to a stranger. And you are aware that your left hand is _not _an actual _girlfriend, _correct?"

Spencer bridled at that. "I'll have you know that my girlfriend is that _stunning_ blonde right over there," he said, and pointed into the Bullpen. Marlowe followed his finger and saw Detective Juliet O'Hara at her desk, pouring over a case file. "And I'll also have you know that she is very satisfied with my sexual acrobatics." Gus made a strange sound like a strangled mew and disappeared out of the building almost at a run.

"Have you asked her?" Marlowe said, perfectly serious. "Let's see, shall we?" She stood up and, hands balled into fists at her sides, strode directly to O'Hara's desk. "Hello again, Detective O'Hara," she said brightly, though her teeth were still clenched. "I was just having the most _fascinating_ conversation with your boyfriend, and he told me that you're…how did he put it exactly? 'Very satisfied with his sexual acrobatics,' I believe. He also felt compelled for some reason to volunteer to me the information that you and he are following the _Kama Sutra_. Your thoughts?"

O'Hara gaped for a long moment, then her pretty, startled face clouded over and she turned a furious glare on the dumbstruck psychic. "Shawn, I think we need to have a _talk," _she said through her own set of gritted teeth. "Interrogation Room B. _Now."_ The pretty little detective fairly dragged her most likely soon-to-be-ex boyfriend out of the Bullpen. Marlowe felt a little low about what she'd done, but it was either that or punch the smarmy son of a bitch, and that would probably qualify as a violation of parole.

Marlowe nearly jumped out of her skin when a warm hand slid across her shoulders and a strong arm embraced her. "I should have shut the dumbass down before he pushed you that far," Carlton said, with his mouth and nose pressed into her hair, "but I was afraid I'd punch the stupid son of a bitch - or shoot him. Are you okay?"

Marlowe reached up and touched his hand. "I'm fine," she said, with a smile, "but I don't think I won any points with your partner_. Or _your psychic."

"Don't worry about it. Dumb bastard had it coming, and maybe O'Hara will finally wake up. Come on - I've done everything that needs doing right now, the rest can wait. Let's go home and get cleaned up so I can take you out and spoil you."

"Mmm, or we can stay _in_ and you can spoil me," Marlowe purred.

"Sounds good to me," Lassiter said, and his voice was throaty, too.

"Detective Lassiter, I'd like to see you in my office, please." Carlton's head jerked up and he blushed when his eyes met those of Chief Karen Vick. "Ms. Viccellio, hello."

"Hello, Ma'am," Marlowe said shyly.

Lassiter gave her a brief hug before following his boss into her office. "Be…right back," he said, sounding uncertain of himself.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough current episodes

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Six: Surprise Surprise<strong>

"So. Caught another one on the fly." Chief Karen Vick moved behind her desk and crossed her arms over her chest.

Lassiter shrugged. "People are stupid. It makes it easy."

"You manage to catch 'em at it a _lot_, though. More than any other officer I've got, I'm certain. My goodness, this makes the third time this year, doesn't it? There was that armed bank robbery you managed to prevent, and then there was the convenience store robbery you stopped while paying for a tank of gas. How fortunate for that store clerk that that was the _one day _you opted not to pay at the pump."

"I wanted a cup of coffee," Lassiter said.

"Yeah, I remember you saying that. It just makes for a nifty coincidence when you add it to the fact that the bank robbery you stopped was at a bank you don't hold an account with."

"I was working a _case."_

"But there were no leads that had anything to do with that establishment, were there?"

"Chief, I don't know what you're suggesting, but you're making it sound like I'm _wrong_ for doing what I perceive as my _job."_

"Oh no, no, I don't think you've done anything wrong," Vick said mildly. "It's just interesting, is all. It makes me a little bit curious. So curious, in fact, that I pulled your clearance records looking for just how many times, in the course of your career, you've managed this kind of serendipitous arrest. _Eighty-seven _times, Carlton. That's a lot of serendipity for one man. You've never struck me as particularly lucky in any other regard. Rather the opposite, in fact."

"Maybe I use up all my good luck on the job," Lassiter grumbled.

"Maybe. Or maybe there's something _else_ at play here."

"Chief…what are you trying to imply?"

"Tell me, Carlton…do you ever have premonitions?"

His eyebrows shot into his hairline. "Excuse me?"

"I'm asking you if you…_foresee_ these things. Psychically."

"Dear sweet God in Heaven, _no," _Lassiter exclaimed fervently.

"So it is all just coincidence, then?" Chief Vick asked.

Lassiter spread his hands helplessly. "I can't explain how or why it happens, Chief, I just react when it does."

"How or why _what_ happens?" Vick said, her eyes narrowing shrewdly.

"All these times I've managed to walk in on crimes in progress, or vice-versa."

Vick seemed physically to subside at that. "Oh. Okay, I'll accept that, although it's a little tough for me to believe in _that kind _of coincidence, I won't lie to you."

"Could I just ask…why would you ever even _consider _suspecting _me_ of being psychic?"

"Because I'd already ruled out the possibility that you were somehow involved in these crimes," Vick said bluntly.

"You had me investigated?" he asked, trying not to bridle.

"No."

"Then how did you rule me out as a suspect?"

"I investigated you myself. If I went to another detective or to Internal Affairs you would have found out." Vick held up one hand placatingly. "I know it sounds terrible but to be honest with you I never really thought you were dirty, I just had to be sure before someone from IA came along and said_ they _were suspicious of all these happenstance arrests. It's ammunition I've had to use, unfortunately."

"When was this?"

"A couple of years ago. Internal Affairs will _never_ be comfortable with an inexplicable arrest record like yours, but once they confirmed my report they closed the investigation, thank God. I tried to keep you from finding out about it and I'm glad to see I was successful - you had enough to worry about at the time. That was during the Yin case. You had, if you'll remember, four or five of these crazy circumstances almost one right after another, that year."

"That was a rough year," Lassiter admitted.

"You popped a lot of Excedrin that year, as I recall."

He grimaced at the memory. "Don't remind me. That was the worst year for migraines since I was a kid."

"My sister had migraines when she was a kid," Vick said. "She always said she smelled burnt toast when one was coming on. You get anything like that?"

"To me it smells like burnt popcorn," Lassiter admitted, "but that doesn't happen very often anymore. Mostly it's just bright flashes."

"Flashes of light?"

He hesitated. "Sort of."

"What do you mean?"

He shrugged. "Sometimes it looks like there are pictures in the flashes, but I can't tell what they're supposed to be."

She nodded as though she understood, and perhaps she even did but there was something faintly shifty about her in that moment, or at least Lassiter thought so. But when she changed the subject he was rather relieved, despite what she changed the subject _to._

"I caught some of that exchange between Mr. Spencer and Ms. Viccellio and O'Hara," she said. "I should thank you, I suppose, for the restraint you showed."

"Yeah…about that," Lassiter said uncomfortably. "I apologize. I know Marlowe shouldn't be in the Bullpen unless there's some official reason for her to be there, and - "

Vick waved it off. "It's not like we can keep Spencer and Guster from invading at their whim, and she was quite well behaved up until provoked - and I've seen her disciplinary record from LOMPOC, so I feel I should thank _her_ for her restraint, as well, under the circumstances."

"Yes. Well. Marlowe isn't a naturally violent person, despite all the time she spent in solitary confinement, she's just…adaptable."

"Well, I know you're looking forward to a nice evening together so I won't detain you, but I just wanted to ask…do you think O'Hara will end it with Spencer because of this?"

Lassiter blinked twice. "Er…because of what Marlowe brought to her attention?" he asked.

"Yeah. I mean, talk about piggish behavior…she's _got_ to realize he's not worth her time by now, right?"

"You mean you…_disapprove _of her relationship with Spencer?" he asked, incredulously.

Vick made a "well _duh" _face. "I'm not a big fan of standing by while _any_ woman submits to the whims and tyrannies of a _man_. Spencer's not physically or emotionally abusive, but he's so damned disrespectful that it works out the same in the end as far as I'm concerned. If O'Hara was a sister of mine I'd sit her down and have a long, hard talk with her, but as her Chief I don't feel I have a right to interfere in personal matters. Although if I thought for a minute he _was _abusive that would be a different matter."

"And here I thought that everyone was on board the Shuliet train and I was the bad guy for not being supportive," Lassiter said.

"A lot of people are…conned…by Spencer's…charm," Vick said slowly. "I had some hopes, years ago, that O'Hara was not one of them, but that hope was dashed. I used to think that partnering her to you would be proof against this kind of thing."

"Why would that be?" Lassiter asked.

"Oh, I don't know. A nice cold splash of reality, I guess. You've never been shy about how little you believe Shawn's psychic snow job. Not that keeping one more cop from falling beneath Spencer's spell was my motivation for making her your partner, of course, I wanted the rookie to have the benefit of your experience. I think you work well together, although…I've noticed that recently the two of you seem a little less cohesive as a unit. Spencer's fault, again, I suspect."

"We're okay," Lassiter said defensively.

"Tell me, did O'Hara ever say anything to you about getting medical treatment after you got T-Boned during the Thane Woodson investigation?"

"I…don't believe she did, Chief, but no one was seriously injured."

"_You _were."

"It was just a mild concussion and some bruising," he defended. "I got treatment."

"Of your own volition."

"Yes."

"O'Hara should have been more concerned about your well-being. Once was a time she would have been."

"She's usually _too _concerned," Lassiter said. "She had a lot on her plate, that one time."

Vick nodded. "I know. Her relationship with Spencer and her professional reputation were on the line. And she put _both_ ahead of her partner's health. That's something I don't care to see in any of my officers."

"I'm _head detective_, Karen, and a big boy."

"And you always put your partner first. You didn't get yourself checked out until _after_ you'd helped O'Hara affect a clearance, correct?"

"I don't walk out in the middle of the action. Besides, she needed backup. Who could she rely on? _Spencer?"_

"Exactly. I just worry how much trouble there'll be before she realizes that herself."

Lassiter shook his head, uncertain he was understanding correctly. "Before she realizes she can rely on Spencer?"

"Before she realizes she _can't. _And so I'll ask again, and I want your honest thoughts: do you think this will end things between them?"

Lassiter took a deep breath and let it out slowly through his crooked nose. "I'd love to tell you yes, Karen, you know I would like nothing better. But no, I don't think it's very likely. He'll apologize for the offense in the most asshole-ish and unapologetic manner possible and just like always, she'll forgive him. And probably get mad at Marlowe, at least a little, for blasting her boyfriend publicly, the way she does whenever _I_ do it. But for whatever it's worth, I don't think she'll _forget_ this."

Vick sighed. "Yeah, that's kind of what I thought, too. Oh well. There's still hope, I guess. Go on, get out of here - you've got a lady waiting."

Lassiter's face split in a wide smile despite himself. "Yes, I do."


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown" (which sucked)

**A/N: **This was meant to be a much longer chapter, or more properly part of a much longer chapter, but ultimately I decided it probably should have been tagged onto the end of chapter six rather than the beginning of what will now be chapter eight, so we have an annoying little interlude.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Seven: A Brief Respite<strong>

"Did I get you in trouble?" Marlowe asked meekly as Lassiter came out of Chief Vick's office to find her waiting in the reception area.

"No, sweetie, it's okay - the Chief just wanted to talk about the arrest I made, is all," he said. Then honesty forced him to add, "There may have been a little personal conversation by the end, but no, no trouble over the, er…'incident.' She did say she was grateful you didn't feed the stupid bastard his teeth - I'm paraphrasing, of course. She was also glad I didn't simply shoot the irritating little twerp."

"So am I," Marlowe admitted. "I confess I was a little worried about what you'd do if I didn't put a cork in his mouth quick."

"I could hear him from my desk," Lassiter said grimly. "I don't know how much longer I could have restrained myself. That was…unusually piggish, even for him."

"I get the distinct impression he doesn't like me."

"He doesn't _know _you," Lassiter said. "If anything, he resents what you represent."

"…Which is?"

Lassiter sighed. "Spencer doesn't like anyone around him to be happy unless that happiness was in some way magnanimously bestowed upon that person by He Himself. I don't even think he's aware of it."

"So…he resents me because I make you happy?"

"That's what _I_ think, anyway."

"That's rather petty and small-minded of him."

"The first thing you learn about Shawn Spencer is that he's a petty and small-minded person," Lassiter said. "Of course, I've got my issues in that direction myself so perhaps I don't have room to talk. Come on, let's get out of here before he shows up again. You feel like finishing out the interrupted shopping spree?"

"Not particularly," Marlowe said. "Ever since I saw you do your best Dirty Harry all I can really think about is getting you home and naked."

Lassiter cleared his throat. His voice was a ragged croak when he spoke. "Home it is, then."

Marlowe smiled and took his arm. "Lead on, Callahan."


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown" (which sucked)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eight: Some Kind of Trouble<strong>

The next few days passed in a kind of happy blur, filled with candlelit dinners and more sex than Lassiter had experienced in the past six or seven years. It was a lamentably brief interlude, but it was long enough to serve its purpose, which was, whether he realized it or not, to reacclimatize him to sharing his life with another person. It was also long enough for him to settle himself to the idea that Marlowe _wasn't _going anywhere, at least in the near future, which was even more important. By the time Monday morning rolled around and he had to saddle up and go back to work he could leave her with the comfortable near-certainty that she would be there when he returned that evening.

"This is a first. I can't remember ever _not_ wanting to go to work before," He muttered into her hair as he hugged her goodbye.

"I'm tempted to ask you to take a couple more days," Marlowe said, her voice muffled against his shirtfront, "but I know Santa Barbara needs its Head Detective back. You'll call me if you're going to run late, right?"

"I will. But I won't run late."

"You can't promise that. As long as I know you're okay, I don't mind waiting."

"The nice part about being Head Detective is the power to delegate authority. I think that I'll be giving that privilege a good workout in coming days."

Marlowe chuckled and nuzzled his chest. "Have a good day, sweetie. I'll see you tonight."

And so a week passed, relatively uneventfully. Work was never truly "slow," but even under the _worst _circumstances a detective spent most of his time behind a desk, buried to the elbows in reports and crime scene photos and boxes of marked evidence. It was the part of the job he was probably best at, though it was the part he despised. The drudgery didn't bother him in the least when he knew that more awaited him at home than a can of Dinty Moore stew and the TV Guide.

It was a week in which his home life slid into a niche that felt truly domestic, for the first time in…well, _forever_, really, except for an extremely brief period during the first days of his marriage. Marlowe's new part-time job teaching a class in reading at the Women's Prison didn't take up much of her time so she was always home before him, and perhaps because she was eager to prove herself in some way, or possibly because she was afraid to test his ability to cook anything more complicated than waffles and scrambled eggs, she always had supper ready when he got off work. Delicious food, excellent company, a glass of wine or, better still, an Old-Fashioned…he was fully cognizant of the fact that he was a lucky, lucky man. After dinner they'd wash the dishes together and, if that didn't lead straight to bed, they'd curl up together on the loveseat and watch television - without once ever really noticing what was on. He lacked only a ring on his finger, a pipe in his teeth, and a loyal dog at his feet to look exactly like the traditional image of the contented family man. And there _was_ a loyal animal at his feet, except that it happened to say "mrow" instead of "arf."

It hadn't taken Lassiter long to notice that the cat was an unusually good judge of people. Of course it showed exceptionally good _taste_ in its willingness to make nice with Marlowe and himself, but it was the way it went about it that convinced Lassiter that Sloppy Joe (the Very Slow, as he secretly thought of him) was more on the ball than a lot of people he knew. With Marlowe the cat was playful and affectionate, almost kittenish, constantly thrumming with a low, rusty purr like an outboard motor. With Lassiter the cat exhibited a quiet, eerily human dignity and remained politely at paw's length except for occasionally repeating the in-the-middle-of-the-back meatloaf posture from that first night. He threw in a new twist, however, by kneading his paws into Lassiter's back or shoulders, claws sheathed, in a surprisingly effective Shi_cat_zu massage. Lassiter was surprised to discover how quickly he was getting used to the animal's presence. And when the cat came in from a brief foray onto the fire escape carrying a freshly-deceased squirrel which he deposited neatly at Lassiter's feet, he was shocked to catch himself grinning at the creature. It seemed cats were good for something, after all.

It wasn't until the _second_ week that he finally realized something was wrong, and not at home. Driving to take statements from the witnesses of a recent robbery, Lassiter at last realized what was off about these trips lately. O'Hara…wasn't talking. Not beyond the occasional professional observation, at least. No endless cheery chirping about everything and nothing, no questions digging into the heart of matters he didn't care to discuss. Clearly she was upset. The saddest thing was, he found himself unable to care about it. She'd broken his hard-won trust by keeping her relationship with Shawn Spencer a secret, and even though he'd tried to move past the hurt of that betrayal he had felt more and more an unbridgeable distance between himself and his partner, one he had progressively less interest in overcoming. Worse still, his respect for her dwindled every time he was forced to watch her roll her eyes and do nothing while her boyfriend did something heinously stupid or disrespectful for which she would, for some unknown reason, immediately forgive him.

He sighed and bit the bullet. Vick wouldn't be happy to know he let a bad state of affairs continue. "Would you care to say something?" he asked his partner. "A word, a shout, a scream? Do you want an apology? Fine. I'm sorry, O'Hara. I'm sorry that you got your feelings hurt. But do you want to know the truth of the matter? Your feelings are going to _get_ hurt, frequently and profoundly, as long as you stay with that man-child you're currently living with."

"Marlowe had no right to stick her nose into my business," Juliet said.

"Spencer had no right to harass her with _your business," _Lassiter retorted. "And I take it you're of the mindset that you'd rather not know how badly behaved your beloved might be?"

"She could have handled it a different way, instead of blurting it out in front of the entire station."

"Spencer could have handled it a different way, too. And for your boyfriend's sake, you should be grateful she only blabbed. He could be getting fitted for false teeth right about now." He parked the car in front of their destination. "I'm also amazed and slightly appalled that _her reaction _to what your boyfriend said is your biggest concern. We're here, so put your game face on."

Juliet sighed. "I want you to be happy, Carlton, but I'm just not sure I get what you see in her."

Lassiter froze in the process of putting on his old Ray-Bans_. "Really? _You really want to go _there?_ Because I have a lot of ammunition to return fire with, you understand that, right?"

"Shawn may not be perfect, but at least he's never tried to kill me."

"Marlowe never tried to kill me. She just wanted to steal my blood, is all, but she couldn't go through with it, could she?"

"Wow, Carlton. That's…a very strange distinction to make. Regardless of her motivations, she still lied to you, and stole, and was party to manslaughter. I don't know about _you, _but _I _value _honesty _in a relationship."

Lassiter slammed his fist on the steering wheel so hard that the horn honked. "That's rich, O'Hara, that's real rich. _You_ value honesty. You're shacked up with the biggest liar in Santa Barbara but _you_ value _honesty."_

"And just what has Shawn lied about?"

"A better question might be what _hasn't_ he lied about? Come on, O'Hara, even if you really are gullible enough to buy into his psychic line of crap, you know every bit as well as I do that he's lied countless times in the course of investigations, withheld evidence, obtained evidence through…shall we say 'questionable measures?'…and generally made our professional lives a living hell. I don't understand how you, an otherwise reasonable, intelligent, _driven_ woman, can tolerate the kind of mockery he regularly makes of honest police work. Or does your professional integrity mean less to you than it does to me?"

"He helps us out. He helps _you_. Or have you forgotten Drimmer…Salamatchia…that PI you were worried you might have killed while you were hopped up on salvia?"

"You say that like I got bombed on _purpose. _And I _haven't_ forgotten, thank you, but how many more times has he made me look like a fool? I'm not saying that I _hate_ the little shit, but I could really use a long vacation from Shawn by-God Spencer. Now if you please, we have work to do. Unless you think we need to call Spencer to do our jobs for us, as usual?" he said, mock-politely.

O'Hara threw open the passenger door and shot out of the car like someone had triggered an ejection seat. Lassiter sighed and climbed out more sedately. He started up the walk to the establishment in question but O'Hara stopped him with a fist planted firmly in the middle of his chest - she didn't _strike _him, but it was quite a thump, regardless.

"Get it out of your system," he said tiredly.

She faced him square-on, and her expression was hard to fathom, a tight mask of what might have been fury or frustration or humiliation or all of the above. Her other fist landed next to the first, and then her forehead struck him fairly solidly right between his collarbones. Her little frame shook. He was afraid she was on the verge of tears.

"Look, I'm sorry, okay? Just…just beat me up and have done with it so we can get back to work."

Her hands moved, and so did her face, grinding into his chest like she intended to bore a hole in him. It took a few seconds for him to realize that she wasn't hitting him, she was…_pawing_ him. Almost…groping.

"O'Hara, what the…?"

She wasn't just pawing and groping, she was _kissing_ him. Lassiter jumped away like she was on fire, as his face now seemed to be. "I'm…I'm…I'm going to call Dobson to take this case," he said after a few false starts. Juliet, hair mussed, had her face hidden in her hands. "Come on, let's get out of here."

He loaded her back in the blue Crown Vic and drove them back to the station, where he led a red-faced and silent O'Hara straight into the Chief's office.

"I think Detective O'Hara needs, er…something," he fumbled lamely, at Vick's questioning brow. "Vacation time, maybe a few sessions with the department shrink, something."

"Explain, please."

"I…I'd rather not, Chief," he said desperately, hoping she'd catch his tone and choose not to pursue the personal issues underlying his admittedly half-baked request. "It's…not related to police business, except insomuch as her health is always an official concern. I just think she'd really benefit from a little…help. It's nothing serious, you see, I just…think she's showing a lot of strain."

"O'Hara? Anything to say?" Vick asked.

"Carlton is right, Chief," Juliet said quietly. "I think I do need a few days off."

"All right," Vick said. "I'll make it happen. Do you want to talk to the doctor?"

"I don't think that's necessary, Chief," Juliet said, still in that small voice, "I just need a little rest."

"If you're sure. Detective Lassiter, I can give you McNab for the rest of the shift if you want him to help you run down witnesses."

"Thank you, Chief." He shot Vick a look of mute gratitude deeper than a thank-you for pairing him with the younger patrolman. Her nod in exchange indicated she understood him on both levels. Lassiter spent the rest of that agonizing day in a blue funk that had less to do with what had happened than with what would happen when he went home. Keeping the incident from Marlowe was not an option - sanctimonious comments aside, honesty was a quality he valued as much as O'Hara claimed to, if not more. _He _knew that what O'Hara had done, whatever her reasons, had no impact on how he felt about his romance…but he didn't know that _Marlowe_ would realize that. There had been a time, years ago, when a sign of interest from O'Hara would have his heart turning freaking cartwheels in his chest. Now it only made him afraid that his girlfriend might misconstrue his _own_ interest.

Lord help him, if he lost Marlowe over this, he was going to _kill_ Shawn Spencer.


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown" (which sucked)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Nine: Possession is Nine Tenths of the Law<strong>

Lassiter knew he was in trouble even before he walked through the door that night.

He wanted Marlowe to be assured that, on his part at least, there was absolutely _nothing to _what happened that afternoon with Juliet, and that whatever the impetus, it was a situation that had been remedied and would _not _be repeated. To do that he had to be upfront, forthright, businesslike. But instead he was cringing, terrified, a man with a guilty conscience. If he couldn't pull it together he'd be damned lucky if she didn't immediately come to the conclusion he'd _initiated_ the encounter.

_Had_ he? He certainly didn't think so, but the idea that Juliet, under strain or not, might suddenly attack him with carnal intent was so patently ludicrous that he had to stop and consider the idea that he might have, accidentally, led her on in some way. But that idea was ridiculous, too, because even when he was _intentionally_ trying to flirt with women he rarely succeeded and usually ran them off. He was so lost in worrying about the possibilities that Marlowe's flying tackle as he came through the door took him totally by surprise.

"Hey, sweetie. Good day?" she asked. He sputtered for a moment. "Hey, what's wrong? You look like I caught you naked in the shower. When you didn't _want_ me to, that is."

His face turned the color of baked brick. "I…uh…I have something to tell you…you're not going to like it."

A guarded expression crossed her face briefly before she adopted a very deliberate air of near-professional optimism. "All right. Let's sit down and talk."

She led him to the loveseat and perched gingerly on the edge of the cushion next to him, still smiling but radiating a palpable aura of fear. "Out with it, Big Guy."

"O'Hara and I…kind of got into it today," he said, "over what happened, you know, with you and Spencer…"

She relaxed, slightly, but concern creased her pretty brows. "You didn't let your temper get the better of you, did you?" she asked. "I mean, this is _O'Hara_ we're talking about, not Spencer himself, so…I mean, there were no guns involved, right?"

He grimaced. "I only wish. No, it's just…things got a little heated, a little acrimonious, and O'Hara got really upset, and…and…and…"

"…And?" Marlowe smiled. "If she hit you I'll have to smack the bitch, just a warning."

"She…she…kinda…kissed me," he mumbled.

"Wh-_what?" _Marlowe sputtered, and then she burst out laughing. He'd imagined many possible reactions to this news, but this was not among them. He felt faintly insulted, ridiculous as it seemed even to him.

"I don't know that _I_ see this as particularly funny," he said.

Marlowe wiped her streaming eyes and fluttered a hand at him. "Go on, sweetie, tell me the whole story. I'm sorry for laughing, but you took me by surprise, is all."

So he told her everything, though he would have liked to spare himself some of the sordid details. When he was done, Marlowe burst out laughing again. "What?" he asked. "I don't understand what is funny about this."

"It's _not_ funny, really, it's just…I don't know, it kind of makes me happy," she said.

He blinked. "Pardon me?"

"You don't get it, do you?" she said. "Juliet jumped on you because she's finally starting to realize that she needs a _real_ man."

He blinked again. "Er…huh?"

"Think about it. If she's got _half _a brain she's got to be adding up all the pros and cons of her current relationship, and I realize that I don't know either of them all that well but I really doubt I'm wrong when I say that that _couldn't_ be a balanced scale. She's clinging because she's probably had to work hard to make it work _this _well so now she wants her relationship dollar's worth out of it, but I bet she's starting to conclude that it's just not going to happen. Add to that the fact that she spends pretty much every day in close proximity and intense emotional connection to someone as strong, handsome, and fantastically opposite Shawn Spencer as you are, and I'm only surprised she lasted this long. It makes me happy because I don't like seeing people tied up in bad relationships - a woman intelligent and driven enough to become a detective is definitely a woman who deserves a respectful, equal partnership with her significant other. Just so long as she's completely aware that _she can't have you."_

A slow smile split Lassiter's lips. "So…you're not…upset about this?"

She shook her head. "I don't see any reason to be upset. So long as _you_ know that _you_ can't have _her. _I'm not the jealous type but I _am _possessive, and _you, _Sir, are _mine."_

The smile broadened into something more certain. "Thank God and all that is Holy for that. Hey, what say we get dressed up and go out for dinner tonight?"

"I've already _made_ dinner, darling," Marlowe said. "Chicken Cordon Bleu, scalloped potatoes, stir-fried veggies and your favorite homemade biscuits. But I'll take a rain check for _tomorrow_ night. I'll let you take me some place insanely over-priced and I'll wear that new black dress with the super-high hemline…and I _won't_ wear panties."

Lassiter sat stock-still and contemplated that for a moment. "Could you…do that…tonight?" he said.

She laughed lightly and kissed him. "Of course."


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown" (which sucked)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Ten: Fools Rush In<strong>

In some ways it was refreshing, discovering that he still cared enough for his partner to worry about her. Not that she _was_ his partner, for the moment. After returning to work from three days off, Juliet quietly requested and received a short-term transfer to the white collar crime division. Lassiter rarely saw her in the days that followed, and then it was only a quick glimpse while she immediately ducked into some room or other. He mostly worried about _her, _but also about their partnership: whatever their differences, however much he'd wanted a new partner in the first crush of pain he felt when he discovered her relationship with the fake psychic, he respected her abilities as an officer of the law and he thought they had turned into a pretty damn good team in spite of everything. He didn't really want to have to start over with someone new, someone who would perhaps be less tolerant of his idiosyncrasies.

For the time being he was working solo, though Chief Vick had offered him Dobson for the duration of the transfer. He had nothing against Dobson, but taking another partner even temporarily would feel too much like infidelity. It made his case load slightly stressful, but that was the price he paid for loyalty.

Another stressor was Shawn Spencer. Apparently Juliet did not choose to disclose the cause of this sudden friction between her and Lassiter, and the psychic lost no opportunity to badger Lassiter for information by nagging, wheedling, bribery, and with smug inferences that it was all surely Lassiter's fault. Lassiter chose to take the high road and ignore the man, but it is difficult to ignore a mosquito that begs to be squashed. The strain of keeping his temper wore him down continually, so that he went home at night more tired than all the casework in the world could make him.

On the day O'Hara came back to work, shortly after she requested and received her temporary transfer, Vick called Lassiter into her office. "Sit down," she said, and gestured to a chair. "O'Hara was less than forthcoming, so I thought I'd ask you: what is this all about? I know you said it had no bearing on police business but if it splits up my best team of detectives then dammit, Carlton, it _does."_

Lassiter took a brief moment to study the cuticles of his folded hands, then squared his shoulders and met his Chief's irate gaze directly. "Detective O'Hara and I had a disagreement over Mr. Spencer that culminated in…er…an uncomfortable circumstance. For both of us, I expect."

"'An uncomfortable circumstance?' What does that even mean?"

Lassiter shrugged helplessly. "It's a hard incident to define, Chief. I know it couldn't have been what it seemed like."

"Just tell me what the hell happened, Carlton."

"Well, it was sort of a…groping…incident."

Karen Vick's eyes got huge. "You…you…_you molested Detective O'Hara?"_

"_What? _No! God, no. She…sort of…accidentally…pawed me. A little. And sort of kissed me. On the chest."

Chief Vick blinked once, stared, and then blinked three more times in rapid succession. "O'Hara…molested _you?"_

"No! No, it wasn't like that at all, Chief, it was purely accidental, I'm sure of it."

"Accidental? Carlton, you 'accidentally' bonk heads with someone when you both reach down for the same piece of paper on the floor. Kissing and groping tends to imply a degree of deliberation."

"But it wasn't, Karen, it couldn't have been. She was stressed about Spencer and angry at me and probably at him and maybe even at herself and it just…just…_happened."_

"She was angry at you, so she grabbed your ass?"

"Well, I have to assume her feelings were a bit more complicated than just anger," he mumbled.

"I would have to assume so as well," Vick said, with an admirable lack of sarcasm in her tone. "How much trouble can I expect because of this?"

Lassiter shrugged again. "I'm only concerned about O'Hara, Chief. I'm more than happy to let the entire incident lie. I just want to be sure she's all right. How _she'll_ handle this situation I can't say."

Vick rubbed her temple. "All right, I'll accept that, for now. Is this…going to cause any trouble for you on a _personal_ level? With Ms. Viccellio?"

He shook his head. "I told her what happened, Chief, and she's fully aware that it was both unintentional and not to be repeated."

Vick nodded thoughtfully. "That's good. How about things between you and Mr. Spencer? There's already quite enough friction there, I don't want it to develop into outright animosity."

Lassiter groaned. "I don't _want_ to get into it with Spencer, Karen, and you know I'll do the best I can to keep myself in check, but he knows where all my buttons are and he's rather fond of pushing them."

"I understand, and believe me, I appreciate the amount of crap you manage to put up with…I just worry about your coping mechanisms, or rather lack thereof. Your temper has threatened to derail your career on more than one occasion in the past - I don't want Shawn Spencer to be the last straw."

"I have been in a bad place, emotionally, for the last…decade or so," Lassiter said. "Things are much better for me now. I think I can handle it, Karen - I really do."

She nodded. "I hope so. And I confess, lately you have been much more tolerant of…everything…than in years past. I have…a fair amount of faith in your ability to keep your finger off your trigger. But please, if you feel things are getting too…intense…I beg you, talk it out with someone before it builds to the point of imminent explosion."

"I will, Chief."

"Er…speaking of stress…do you think maybe O'Hara is finally cutting it off with Spencer? I mean, jumping you has _got_ to mean she's reconsidering him, right?"

"I only wish I knew, Chief. All I know for certain is that if she's ended it with him, Spencer hasn't gotten the memo yet."

Vick sighed. "I really wish that girl would wake up and smell the winter blend. Things would run so much smoother around here if Shawn Spencer was kept properly at _arm's length."_

"Can I requisition longer arms?" Lassiter quipped before he could think better of it. Chief Vick allowed herself the ghost of a smile.

"I sometimes wish for that myself, Carlton. Dismissed."


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eleven: Rainforests and Strip Malls<strong>

Over the following weeks Lassiter experienced a resurgence of migraine headaches of a power he hadn't experienced since he was a teenager, but otherwise he managed to keep the stress in check with the willing and able assistance of his girlfriend and, oddly enough, his cat. But on the Friday night he dragged himself through the door too tired even to eat the delicious meal that awaited him, Marlowe put her foot down.

"That does it, Mister. This weekend you are _resting, _and Monday morning you're going straight into Chief Vick's office and requesting a temporary partner reassignment."

"Yes, Ma'am," Lassiter mumbled meekly. Though he was already half asleep at the table he made an heroic effort to fork down at least a mouthful of beef tortellini. "But tomorrow I'm taking you to that tropical rainforest presentation at the botanical gardens you wanted to see."

"It's more important that you relax."

"What's more relaxing than the botanical gardens? You wanted to go to this thing, and I want to make it happen. I'll be just fine after a good night's sleep."

"Are you sure? I know you're not into the whole…plant thing. We don't have to go if you don't want to."

"Are you kidding? All I can think about it somehow getting you alone behind a banyan tree."

She laughed. "Sounds terrific, as long as you don't mind courting charges of public indecency."

"I'd court some indecency right now if I had the energy," he mumbled, and nearly face-planted into his pasta. Marlowe rescued the plate and pushed him upright.

"Come on, big fella, off to bed," she said. He managed to hoist himself out of the chair and stumble-foot into the bedroom, where he collapsed across the King-sized mattress fully dressed. Marlowe pulled off his shoes and socks and tucked him in. "If you've got the strength, you should probably at least slip off your holster."

He didn't have the strength. In fact, he was already asleep. She smiled, stroked an errant apostrophe of silver-black hair out of his face, and prepared herself for bed.

The next morning she awoke to discover that at some point during the night he took off his clothes, though evidently he hadn't had the energy to put on his pajamas. Not that she minded. She snuggled close against him and reveled in the feel of his bare skin. Eyes of a heartrendingly brilliant shade of sky blue fluttered open and locked on hers, so bright they seemed lit from within. They were breath-taking, but there was something off about them - perhaps it was just sleepiness that made them seem slightly out of focus, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say _over_-focused, like instead of looking _at_ her, they were looking _into_ her.

"Good morning," she said, a little uncertainly. He said something in a voice too quiet to hear. "Sorry, didn't catch that."

He didn't repeat himself. Instead those eyes slowly closed and opened again, and that strange brilliance faded. They were still heartbreakingly beautiful eyes, but no longer unnerving.

"Good morning," he said, though he sounded even less sure of it than Marlowe had.

"Are you feeling okay, sweetie?" Marlowe asked.

"…Yeah," Lassiter responded, and the word was drawn into something containing three or four syllables. "Er…is the cat staring at me?"

Marlowe propped herself up on her elbow and peered over his shoulder. Sloppy Joe sat on the bedside table, yellow eyes wide and round and indeed fixed quite firmly, or so it seemed, on the back of Lassiter's tousled head. "He does appear to be, yes."

"Could you please get him to stop? He's kind of freaking me out."

As if on command, Joe hopped down and waddled out of the room with his fluffy belly swinging and his fluffier tail waving like a banner. "Problem solved," Marlowe said.

Lassiter relaxed visibly. "Sometimes I get the feeling there is something seriously creepy about that cat. Like…_Stephen King _creepy."

_The cat…or the cat's master? _Marlowe thought. She immediately chastised herself for thinking that way - even if she was right, and Carlton _did _have some sort of extra-normal ability he wasn't even aware of, he was most assuredly _not creepy_. No matter what her now-former girlfriend Allison said during their ill-fated reunion dinner the week before.

She didn't bother asking him to repeat what he'd said in that near-silent whisper. Upon reflection, from the sibilants and hard consonants she'd managed to catch, she had an idea that he might have said, _"She wants to name him Dashiel." _Maybe she was crazy. That was a secret, after all, that she'd kept even from Adrian - the fact that if she should, one day, happen to have a son, she wanted to name him Dashiel. Carlton had almost certainly said something completely different and her subconscious was just overlaying its own opinions.

She pushed it from her thoughts and rose to prepare for the day. Lassiter got up, too, and they showered together as they usually did - "to conserve water," as he said, with that half-grin that made his eyes crinkle up and flash wicked glints of tourmaline blue. He made breakfast - French toast, sausage, eggs, and fresh-squeezed orange juice - and they spent a quiet couple of hours together on the couch watching a Three Stooges marathon and tossing kibble at the cat, watching him snap each crunchy piece out of the air like an alligator at a Florida tourist attraction.

Marlowe snuggled into his shoulder as the episode _Busy Buddies _came on. "There's no replacement for the real thing," she said. "Once Shemp and Curly were gone they should have hung it up. Joe Besser was far funnier working solo and Curly Joe Dorita was a sad attempt to clone the original."

"Which do you prefer: Shemp or Curly?"

"I know it's the 'in' thing to say Shemp, since he was first in Vaudeville and Curly _did_ base his style on what Shemp originated, but I'm a Curly-maniac. He had it coming and going."

Lassiter squeezed her shoulders and chuckled. "Damn, where have you been all my life?"

"I'm eight years younger than you. _I_ get to ask that question."

Lassiter checked his watch. "We'd better get going. Rainforest presentation starts in forty-five minutes, and it'll take about that long to get there."

Marlowe yawned and stretched. "I can hardly make myself move, this is so comfy."

He pulled her to her feet and planted a kiss on the top of her head. "Come on - you've been looking forward to this."

They enjoyed a few quiet hours at the botanical gardens, first through the presentation and then just strolling through the grounds. Lassiter _wasn't_ much on the "plant thing" but the scenery was nice and the company improved it. They might have spent the entire afternoon there but a sudden headache cut the outing short.

"Are you okay to drive, sweetie?" Marlowe asked in concern. Lassiter thought for a moment, then handed her the keys. He loaded himself into the passenger seat with a wrong-handed awkwardness that spoke to how seldom he rode there. He sat with one knee drawn up almost to his chest and a hand on his brow, shading his eyes. Marlowe started the car and pulled out of the lot.

"Make a left turn up here," Lassiter said, about six blocks later. Marlowe didn't know why, since that took them in exactly the wrong direction from home, but she put on the signal and got in the turning lane. Two more lefts and a right later, Lassiter directed her to park the car. She had no idea what was so important about the little strip mall he'd brought her to, but she parked all the same.

There was a bank in the strip mall, a tiny outlet of a larger chain common in the area. Given its location, Marlowe doubted that Lassiter did any business there, but that was where he headed when he climbed out of the car. Although she suspected she was putting herself in considerable danger, Marlowe followed. If she wanted to know what was going on with her beloved, she needed to _see_ what happened next.


	12. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Twelve: A Shot in the Dark**

Marlowe caught up with Lassiter inside the bank. He did not join the line of people waiting for an open teller, but hovered near the back of the building not far from the uniformed security guard, who seemed to recognize him. Not exactly unexpected, given his local notoriety, and apparently his reputation for being at the right place at the right time for preventing crimes was also known to the guard, who was now checking out the customers with a suspicious eye and a hand on the butt of his baton. Marlowe didn't want to cause any difficulties for either of them if something should happen, so she took up her own position on a bench behind them and made herself small and inconspicuous.

She didn't have long to wait. Within five minutes a man in a ski mask burst through the doors, brandishing a handgun. It was over in little more than a heartbeat - in the perfect position to act, Lassiter knocked the gun out of the man's hand with one fist and knocked him out with the other. He was as neatly trussed as a Thanksgiving turkey before regaining consciousness, with Lassiter's handcuffs on his wrists. "You have the right to remain silent, if you refuse that right anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you cannot afford an attorney one will be provided to you…"

It was the last straw. Marlowe couldn't see any reason for Lassiter to have known that there would be a robbery at _that_ bank at _that_ time other than through psychic channels, unless he was getting tipped off by secret informers. That somehow seemed the less likely possibility, given the number of times he managed to get the jump on these crooks. There couldn't be that many people in the know willing to rat out their buddies and not even receive credit or lighter sentences or _something_ in exchange. How long had it been this way? Why had neither he nor, apparently, anyone else ever suspected there was something…_different _about him?

Back at the police station for processing, Marlowe noted that Lassiter's headache appeared to have cleared up. She wondered at that. He always got a headache every time they parked the car in the parking garage at Prospect Gardens, and she wondered at _that, _too. Maybe these headaches were, in some way, connected to this strange ability of his, or maybe it was sheer coincidence. He did, after all, get a _lot _of headaches, and what possible reason could there be for his getting one each time they parked in their reserved space?

_He was chasing a suspect and got ambushed uptown somewhere. In a parking garage. _The memory of his words struck her with almost physical force. Surely the uptown parking garage where Lassiter's father met his untimely end couldn't possibly be…?

"Ms. Viccellio, would you mind stepping into my office for a moment? I have a couple of fairly informal questions I'd like to ask."

Marlowe's attention snapped to the neat, always composed presence of Chief Karen Vick. A trifle nervous - she was, after all, a rightfully convicted ex-con, regardless of how little like a criminal she felt - Marlowe followed her into the office.

"You were present, again, for Detective Lassiter's latest off-duty arrest?" she asked.

"Yes, Ma'am," Marlowe affirmed.

"I'd like to get your take on the incident, if I may," Vick said. "Can you please tell me exactly how Carlton ended up at that bank?"

Marlowe shrugged. "I was driving, Ma'am, because Carlton had a terrible headache, but he gave me directions. I don't know how he knew where to go or what made him go there: we were on our way home."

"From where?"

"The botanical gardens."

"So you ended up quite a long way from your destination. You didn't question him about his directions?"

"No, Ma'am. I figured he knew what he was doing."

"And in the bank - did he say anything then?"

"No Ma'am, not that I heard. There wasn't much time before the robber showed up, though, or rather would-be robber, I guess."

"And was Carlton behaving in any way out of the ordinary? Did he seem distracted or dazed in any way?"

Marlowe shook her head. "He seemed pretty dialed-in to me, single-minded. That's not exactly out of the ordinary for him, as far as I've seen."

Karen Vick dropped into her chair with a scowl of frustration on her face. "If the damned stubborn man would just _talk_, maybe we could figure out what's going on with him," she said.

"What do _you _think is going on with him, Ma'am? If you don't mind me asking."

Chief Vick looked at her thoughtfully for a moment and chewed the inside of her lip. Then she said, "I think the man might be psychic but he seems vehemently opposed to the very possibility, which isn't too surprising considering his experience with so-called 'psychics.'"

Marlowe felt an almost unaccountable sense of relief. She wasn't alone, and if someone as seemingly sensible and practical as the Chief of Police was nearly convinced of what was, admittedly, a fairly far-fetched idea, then there had to be something to it.

"I…have an idea of who I want to talk to about that very question," she said, a bit shyly, "and I was wondering if perhaps you can't help me out with something, too. I was wondering if the department keeps some sort of personnel file on officers who have been killed in the line of duty. In about 1982."

"We keep files on _all_ personnel, past and present," Vick said. "You want to know something about Lassiter's father, right?"

Marlowe nodded. "Specifically, where was he killed?"

Chief Vick sat up straight and punched a button on her intercom. "Adams, I need the personnel file of Officer Charles Carlton Lassiter, dates of service 1963 to 1982."

"Yes Ma'am," the crackly voice of the file clerk responded. Fifteen minutes later he came in, carrying a thin manila folder. "Sorry for the delay, Chief - file was in the wrong spot, alphabetically, I had to dig for it."

"Thank you, Adams," Vick said, and opened the folder. "Let's see…ah, here it is. Yes, it says here that Charles Carlton Lassiter was killed in a parking garage at…1102 Prospect…Gardens…" She trailed off and looked incredulously at Marlowe. "That's the parking facility for your condo complex."

Marlowe nodded. "I suspected as much. Now I suppose the question is does Carlton know that? He said he doesn't remember much about his father or the circumstances of his death, but it could just be that he doesn't want to talk about it, I suppose."

"Why? What made you wonder about this, exactly?" Vick asked.

"He always, and I mean _always, _gets a headache every time he enters the garage. It clears up again immediately after he leaves the place. He says its carbon monoxide but I have my doubts, and the building manager says he's tested several times now and the levels are no higher than you'd _ever_ find in a parking garage. He doesn't seem to have a problem with _other_ parking facilities. I'm just wondering if these headaches aren't some kind of symptom of whatever it is he's picking up, psychically, if that's what's happening."

"So how do you intend to find out about all of this?" Vick asked. "Who is it you're planning on talking to?"

Marlowe took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. "His mother."


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Fourteen: Bearding the Lioness**

"Sweetie, I need to borrow the car for a bit, is that okay?" Marlowe asked. Lassiter looked up from his paperwork, brows creased in a clear question.

"Er…sure. Bored?"

She shook her head. "I just wanted to meet with someone and when I called they said right now was good. I don't know how long I'll be, though, so will you be all right to get home if I run too late?"

He looked like he wanted to ask _who_ she was going to meet, but instead he merely handed her the keys to the Fusion. "Thanks, babe. I'll call you when I finish up."

"Have a nice…visit," Lassiter said uncertainly, and did not take his worried gaze from her until she turned the corner down the stairs and dropped out of sight.

Marlowe put on her sunglasses in the bright glare outside the Santa Barbara Police Department and, with some little trepidation, drove to the home of Irene Mary Lassiter. She had not yet, officially, met Carlton's mother, and had a strong suspicion that the woman already did not like her, although she didn't know if her criminal record was the only reason. She had, in her few brief and painfully terse telephone conversations, taken away the impression she was dealing with Catholic high dudgeon for the fact that she and Mama Lassiter's Blue-Eyed Boy were living in sin, despite the fact that Mama Lassiter was, too, and with another woman.

The word "hypocrite" came to mind, but Marlowe recognized that she was dealing with a mother's love for her son, which was hardly reasonable even in the best of cases, so she tried not to think bad thoughts before she even met the woman face-to-face for the first time. Still, she felt more than a little like Perseus going to face Medusa in her lair. Harry Hamlin, not Sam Worthington. She hadn't had a chance or, particularly, the inclination to see the remake. She supposed the special effects would be fantastic but somehow she couldn't watch a movie with Liam Neeson playing Zeus, no matter how much she liked the actor in other roles.

She parked the car out front of the little house and took a deep, steadying breath. Then she climbed out of the car and up the little concrete walk to the front stoop. Before she could even knock on the door it was opened, and the woman on the other side was neither Irene Lassiter nor her girlfriend, Althea Daniels. The dark brown eyes were as far from the pale blue she'd seen in the picture on Lassiter's end table as she had ever seen, but something in the woman's face spoke of close relation just the same.

"You must be Marlowe," the woman said. "Nice to meet you, dear. Come in, please."

"Um, yes, er…hi. Uh…I'm sorry, I'm afraid I was expecting…"

"My sister. Irene is here, I just wanted my chance to look you over before she hit you with both barrels, so to speak. I'm Carolyn, Carlton's aunt."

That triggered a memory. "Oh, of course. You were with the Ventura PD, am I remembering that correctly? Carlton told me about you."

"That's right. I'm actually responsible for his existence, in a round-about sort of way. I introduced Irene to his father. Of course, at the time I didn't know my sister swung the other direction, but then again I don't think _she_ knew it at the time, either. My, but you are lovely, aren't you? Forgive me if I seem to be gawking - it's difficult to get three sentences in succession out of my nephew and I'm afraid his description of you did little to satisfy my curiosity. Curiosity is both a virtue and a character flaw of any good detective, as you may be discovering for yourself."

"I'm actually finding that an ability to put oneself in the way of crime before it actually happens is the more annoying trait, at least in so far as coming up with a rational explanation for it."

The woman's pleasant expression turned sharp, and Marlowe saw a familiar spark of professional inquiry in her eyes. "I see. Come, dear - have a seat. I suspect you have something quite interesting to say."

The woman led her into a small parlor room where two other women sat at a card table laid out with a hand of King's Corner. Both women were rather heavy-set, like Carolyn, and Marlowe recognized them both immediately - the Mistress of the house and her girlfriend. Irene swept a scornful ice-blue gaze over her from head to toe and back again, a gaze that lingered offensively on her midsection for a moment too long, in that speculative way all women had to endure when newly married or living with a man. There hadn't even been enough time for…for…_that _to show in the first place, even if she'd managed to get pregnant their first night together.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in," Irene said in her three-pack-a-day voice. "Looking for handouts, Cookie? Sorry, but _Booker's_ the only one in the family who ever had a soft spot for stray animals."

"Oh, put a cork in it, Reney," Carolyn said. "Haven't you gotten tired of alienating your family by now?"

A well-manicured fingernail stabbed the air in Marlowe's direction. _"That _is not family."

"She might as well be. Besides, I meant Carlton. He won't be at all happy to hear you're mistreating his beloved, will he? And he is currently the only child you've got who's still masochistic enough to put up with you on a regular basis. Now, Marlowe, dear, please do have a seat and say what's on your mind. Can I deal you in?"

Marlowe eyed the card game warily. "Oh, no, thank you, I never intended to stay long. Carlton is at the police station right now and I'd like to get back soon so he doesn't have to beg a ride from someone. I just had…what I hope is a simple question to ask."

Carolyn shuffled the deck with an expert's hand. "Good call, dear. King's Corner is the dullest game in the history of cards, with the possible exception of Old Maid. I come here once a week to play it. I consider it a family duty."

"You never complained about it before," Irene said huffily.

"I don't complain, sister dear, because King's Corner is the only game I have ever managed to teach you to play. Frankly, Althea and I would rather play Five Card Stud or Texas Hold-'Em. Do you play, dear?" Carolyn asked Marlowe abruptly. "If you did perhaps we could start up a Poker Night with Carlton for our fourth. If he'd be willing to play surrounded by women, two of whom are old biddies."

"I've played before," Marlowe admitted. "I mostly lose."

"But you're teachable, I assume. Anyway, that's a matter for another time. Please, dear, ask your question. Don't worry about hostile witnesses - I have my way of wringing confessions out of recalcitrant fools."

Marlowe didn't doubt it. She had assumed somehow that Carlton got his love of and aptitude for police work from his father, but though this woman could not have looked less like him and still be obvious family, there was more than a little about her shrewd manner that Lassiter had inherited. Or adopted.

"I was wondering if perhaps, while Carlton was growing up…you noticed anything _unusual_ about him?"

Irene snapped her hand of cards against the edge of the table. "Of course not. There's nothing wrong with my boy. Is there something wrong with _you_ that you'd think so?"

"I don't think there's anything wrong with Carlton whatsoever," Marlowe said, defensively. "I asked if there was anything _unusual_ about him, not _wrong."_

"Irene is not a woman who understands distinctions like that," Carolyn pointed out. "Be specific, dear. There's no attorney to call out an objection for leading the witness here."

"I want to know if Carlton ever showed signs of being psychic."

"What? Don't be stupid. Of course not. Where would you ever get an idea like that?" Irene said, but Marlowe couldn't help but think she was lying through her teeth.

Apparently she wasn't the only one who thought so. "What about Imogene?" Carolyn asked. "Explain _that, _if you would."

"Carol, I don't know what you're talking about."

Carolyn turned to Marlowe and explained. "Imogene Lassiter was Carlton's father's great-aunt. She lived in Missouri, never married, and lived off a sizeable inheritance from her parents. When Carlton was seven years old he walked into the house from the back yard and told his parents that Great-Aunt Imogene was dead. 'She had an art-attack,' he said. The next morning the family got a call from a Missouri law firm. Imogene was dead and Charles was the primary beneficiary of her Will."

"She had a _heart_ attack," Irene said, sounding sulky.

"Which could still be excused as a seven year old who doesn't _quite_ understand the message he's passing on," Carolyn pointed out, "except it gets better. Turns out Imogene _had_ her heart attack at the art gallery where she volunteered the bulk of her time. She fell off a ladder and managed to pull a rather large and _heavy_ Jackson Pollack canvas down on top of her. That sounds like an 'art attack' to _me."_

"It still doesn't mean anything," Irene Lassiter grumbled. "Just a coincidence."

"Honey, where I come from they've got another name for something like _that," _Althea said. "They call it the _Shine."_

"Why don't you tell Marlowe about what happened when Charles was killed?" Carolyn said. "That was _no_ coincidence, by any standard."

"What happened?" Irene asked. "Booker was sick, that's all. I don't see how a supposedly rational woman, a former police detective, could call that anything other than a coincidence, particularly since he was sick a _lot_ in those days."

Carolyn made an "Oh, Pish" noise. "Carlton got headaches, Irene, he didn't get sick, _ever _as far as I could tell. If he did he never said boo-hiss about it. And what happened that day was _not_ a simple illness and you know it. Would you call me up in a dead panic over a case of _stomach flu?"_

"He gave me a little fright."

"A little fright? Irene, when I got here that boy was _dead_. Laid out on his back in bed, still in his school clothes, eyes wide open, no breath, no pulse, no _life_. He was dead when you called me and he was dead when I walked through the door twenty minutes later, and he only sprang back to life when the call came in from the Chief of Police about Charles, at least five minutes later. And then he acted like nothing happened at all."

"The doctor said he had a spike of extremely low blood pressure," Irene mumbled. "You made a mistake."

"Bullshit. I know a corpse when I see one, Irene. I don't know how it happened or even why, but somehow Carlton _shared_ Charles's death."

"Carolyn, if there was all this…_psychic phenomena _associated with Carlton when he was a boy, why doesn't he realize _now_ that he's psychic?" Marlowe asked.

"I'll tell you exactly why," Carolyn said, and pointed at her sister. _"That's _why. Right after the Imogene incident, Irene took it upon herself to guilt the psychic right the hell out of the poor boy. She went the whole Catholic route, short of exorcism, and I'm fairly certain she considered _that, _too. Any time he showed the slightest sign of having a vision or even just a bit of intuition she squashed him under Bible studies and Confession and the most gruesome possible stories about false prophets and Inquisitions. I think she had him half convinced he'd be burnt at the stake, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn he had nightmares where _she _tossed the first torch on the pyre."

Irene's face was bright red by the time her sister finished. "Booker was odd enough without _that_ nonsense to contend with," she said.

"Yes, and what you did for him really made him so very _normal," _Carolyn scoffed. "Seems to me he would have been a lot better off if he could've learned a bit about who he is and what he's capable of, rather than having to hide it down so deep he can't even tell the truth about it to _himself."_

"So if Carlton has been repressing it all these years, why does it all seem to be coming up now?" Marlowe asked. "Even his Chief suspects he might be psychic, although I don't know how long she's been wondering about it."

Carolyn shrugged. "Beats me, dear. I'm afraid I really don't know the first thing about abilities like Carlton's, if anyone _does_. But I would hazard a guess that _you_ might have something to do with it, if I had to."

"_Me? _Why me?"

"Don't take it the wrong way, dear, but…er…well, the circumstances of your relationship have been a bit…stressful. And then moving in, that's a big adjustment to make. Add that to all the work stress he's had over the past few years, this past year in particular it seems to me, and I for one am not surprised to hear that he's losing control. I'm just glad it's his over his psychic abilities and not his _temper_, like in years past."

"So how do I help him through this?" Marlowe asked.

"Just be there for him, I suppose. I'm not a motherly person, I never cared much for children, but I will confess I've always had a special fondness for my nephew - of course, he never was particularly _childlike _so that might be the reason. You will take good care of him, won't you? He's had it kind of rough in the romance department."

"I have every intention of it, Ma'am."

"Good to hear. Keep me posted on the psychic situation, won't you? Maybe I can give you a hand here and there in coping with it." 

"I will, Ma'am. It was a pleasure to meet you," Marlowe said, and she meant it. She was less truthful when she said it to Irene. "I'd better get going. Carlton is probably close to finished with his report by now, if he hasn't finished already."

"Nice to meet you, too, dear," Carolyn said. "Keep that Poker Night idea in mind, won't you? It would be so nice to play a hand every once in awhile with someone who isn't on Medicare and has more to talk about than their latest bowel movement."

Oh yeah, Marlowe could see where a _lot_ of Carlton's idiosyncrasies came from. She smiled. "I'll bring it up to Carlton, but I don't know if he'll be easy to sway. I have a feeling he might try and hide in the closet or under the bed if I ask him to play a poker game where there's bound to be a lot of girl talk."


	14. Chapter 14

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Fifteen: That's the Way I Remember It<strong>

Even though she was glad to have answers to some of her questions, and gladder still to have found something of an ally in Carlton's blunt, no-nonsense aunt, she was still left with the dilemma of what to do with the information she now possessed. If she could convince Carlton that he was psychic, what would that knowledge do for him? Or _to_ him, for that matter. He wasn't exactly fond of psychics, though Marlowe doubted very much he'd ever met a _real_ one before.

And she was a little bit scared, thanks to the story of what happened to him when his father died. Whatever he'd experienced, the memory of it might well be something that _ought_ to remain buried. If she dredged it up for him again, what might _that _do to him? If he really experienced his father's murder as if first-hand, that had to be _beyond_ traumatic.

She was tempted to just tell Chief Vick what she'd learned and let _her_ decide what should be done about it, but that was cowardly. Carlton was her responsibility now, as Aunt Carolyn had intimated. How much easier would that responsibility have been if all she had to break to him was a bad case of halitosis, or stinky cheese feet? It didn't bear thinking about. Thankfully she didn't have to deal with any of that in _addition_ to the psychic thing.

She called Carlton's cell on her way back to the car and found him just finishing up. "Great - I'm on my way, and you don't have to catch a ride home. Be right there, sweetie," she said. She found him waiting on a bench in front of the station when she pulled up.

"I'm hungry," he said as he climbed in. "Is there any place you'd like to go for dinner?"

Marlowe looked down at her faded jeans and peach-colored blouse. "I'm not really dressed for anything fancy. Pizza?"

"Sounds good to me. Do you like Hawaiian?"

Marlowe wrinkled her nose. "Ham and pineapple? Er…not really."

"Thank God. Neither do I."

"I do like ham pizza, though," Marlowe said. "Canadian bacon, or whatever the pizzerias want to call it. Does your aversion to pineapple have anything to do with a recent run-in with Mr. Spencer?"

He sighed. "He was there bugging me for entry into a case I'm working. Now that Henry's retired I don't have any buffer at all. But he wasn't being _really_ irritating so I suppose I should be grateful."

"Have you spoken to Detective O'Hara lately?"

"She's still hiding when she catches sight of me."

"You worried about it?"

"We worked together rather well. It's not easy for me to work tandem, so who knows how hard it will be to break in a new partner?"

"Is that your _only_ concern?"

"Well…maybe not exactly. I mean, we've had our differences but I consider her a friend, and I don't exactly have a lot of friends. I really didn't want to lose that."

"Who says you've lost it? She'll come around, you've just got to give her a good talking to. Right now she probably doesn't know _what _you think of her." Marlowe drove them to a pizzeria not far from their condominium complex. She sipped her beer in silence while they waited, and thought about exactly how to say what needed to be said.

"I…met your Aunt Carolyn today," she began.

"Really? That surprises me. Aunt Carolyn doesn't really wander much. Where did you happen upon _her?"_

"At your mother's house."

Lassiter choked on his lager. _"That's _where you went? Did you come away unscathed?"

"Not entirely. I do like your aunt, but I think it's pretty obvious that I'm not good enough for you, in your mother's eyes at least. I'm not saying she doesn't have a point."

"On the end of her nose, and there's a bit, witchy wart on it," he said. "No wonder you didn't tell me where you were going. The question now is _why?"_

"I wanted to ask her about you," Marlowe admitted. "About what you were like as a kid. I found out more from your aunt than your mother wanted to tell me."

Lassiter's brow furrowed. "Why so interested in my childhood?" he asked. "You never asked _me_ about it."

"I have, actually," Marlowe said. "You've been a bit evasive on certain subjects. And there's some things I just don't think you remember."

"A lot of people don't remember much about their childhoods," Lassiter said. "Mostly because they're boring and ordinary. Like mine."

Marlowe nodded. "Yes, I know people don't tend to retain much from their earliest years. But you're missing a lot more than just what decoration was on your third birthday cake."

"Oscar the Grouch," he said promptly, then blanched at the expression on her face. _"What?"_

"My point exactly, Carlton. Your memory is awfully damned good for someone who can't remember something as big and important as their father's funeral."

"I remember it," he said. "I remember the salute of arms, the flag on the coffin, mom in her black pillbox hat with the half-veil. I think it was the first time I ever had to wear a suit, because I don't think I was allowed to go to my grandfather's funeral. Too young."

"What was the weather like?"

He shrugged. "What difference does it make?"

"Well, was it raining? Cloudy? Sunny? What?"

"It's Santa Barbara, Marlowe," he said. "I suspect it was sunny."

"But you don't know."

"What's your point?"

"When they buried my grandfather it was drizzling rain," Marlowe said quietly. "I was nine, four years younger than you were. My grandmother died three years after he did. It was a bright, sunshiny day at the graveside for the ceremony. I barely knew either of them, because they lived in Ohio. But I remember what the weather was like at their funerals."

He shrugged. "So you pay more attention to the weather. I don't usually notice it."

"What was the weather like on the day you graduated from the police academy?" she asked.

He grimaced. "It was the worst rainstorm of the decade."

"And you remember it."

"Hey, it was the worst rainstorm of the _decade!" _he defended. "Besides, it was a really, _really_ big day for me. I graduated from the _police academy. _And my mother told me she was moving in with her lesbian lover."

"What was the weather doing on your wedding day?"

"It was sunny. Kind of windy, though."

"How about the day you passed your first firearms certification exam?"

"Sunny and hot as the gates of hell."

"But you don't remember for sure what the weather was like on the day you buried your father."

The server brought their pie out. "Hey, I told you - my dad wasn't around much. He really never made a big impression on me while he was alive, so I guess his death was just more of the same."

"According to your Aunt Carolyn, his death had an _enormous_ impact on you."

He shrugged and swallowed a bite of pepperoni. "I don't know what to tell you. She's not usually mistaken about things but this time I'm afraid she is."

"How about Aunt Imogene?" Marlowe asked quietly.

"_Who?"_

"Aunt Imogene. Your father's aunt. Great-aunt."

He looked quizzical for a moment longer, then his expression cleared slightly. "Oh, yeah, her. She died when I was little, I never even met her."

"She had an art attack, right?"

A look of panic settled onto his features, overlaying the confusion that remained. "A…heart attack. She had a heart attack."

"But that's not what you told your family. When it happened."

He passed a shaking hand over his now completely gray face. "What are you doing?" he asked. He sounded helpless. "Why are you dredging all this up?"

"I don't really want to, Carlton, believe me," Marlowe said. "But I don't think it's very healthy to deny a part of yourself just because someone told you when you were little that it was the wrong way to be. How do you think your _mother _would feel if she never admitted to herself that she was homosexual?"

"I'm not…homosexual," Carlton said. Marlowe smiled.

"I certainly hope not," she said, "because if you were then I'd have to get gender reassignment surgery and I don't fancy the Chaz Bono look. But that's not the point, Carlton. _You have a gift_. Your mother may have meant well, trying to…er…wean you off of it…but she was wrong to try. You can't change it about yourself any more than you can change the color of your eyes."

He gave her a wan smile. "Colored contacts," he pointed out.

Marlowe waved that off. "They just cover the truth, they don't change anything for real. Truth doesn't change."

"What do you want me to do?" he asked. "Open a little fortune teller's stand, start reading palms and tea leaves?"

"I'll be satisfied if we can just get rid of the headaches," Marlowe said. "But we do have to tell your Chief."

"What? Why?"

"Because she already _knows_, Carlton, she just wants to hear you say it. Besides, maybe she won't make you work with Spencer so much anymore."

He blanched. "Are you kidding? She'll probably make him my new partner."

"She wouldn't do that to you. Besides, he's a consultant, not a cop. Come on, Carlton - this could be a _good_ thing. Try and be optimistic."

"I'm trying. It's not working."

Marlowe took her first bite of pizza, chewed, and swallowed. "It's going to be okay, Carlton. We'll get through this together. Just you and me and Chief Vick and Aunt Carolyn…and Mr. Spencer and Detective O'Hara and everyone else in this crazy mixed-up jumble."


	15. Chapter 15

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**A/N: **The "sliding glass door incident" actually happened to Tim Omundson, according to his interview with the Pop My Culture podcast crew (look it up online if you haven't heard it and if its still available, it's an hour of amazing zaniness and not to be missed). I appropriated it for use here because it was too good to pass up. Consider it an homage and not a lazy writer who couldn't think up her own dirty little secret to spring on Shawn.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Sixteen: Flash Cards<strong>

It took a few days for Marlowe to work out a plan of action, but when she laid it out to the others involved she was surprised and pleased at how enthusiastically they jumped aboard. _Carlton _wasn't terribly happy, but then she hadn't exactly expected him to be. His deeply buried secret was out in the open now, and that had to be a relief, didn't it? He'd come around in time.

He wasn't alone, after all. Even if his mother wasn't thrilled with the idea of having a psychic son, he had family support. Lauren was delighted to learn that her long-idolized big brother had a streak of supernatural in his makeup and threw herself into a self-imposed research project that Marlowe thought of as "the Care and Feeding of Psychics." Some of the tips and ideas she'd brought up already had promise. Of course, Carlton didn't like the battery of tests and tricks she tried to get him to submit to, particularly when she suggested filming the whole thing. "I am _not_ a class project, Lulu," he growled at her on that occasion.

Aunt Carolyn was more than happy to add her "assistance," against his objections as well. Suggested by Marlowe, signed off on by Vick, Carolyn stepped out of retirement and into the role of Consultant Liaison recently vacated by Henry Spencer. The fact that she was Carlton's aunt was not widely known, and no one went out of their way to _make_ it known. Lassiter did prefer Henry on his fishing boat to Henry riding the desk opposite his, stealing paperclips and surreptitiously inching his desk forward so that Lassiter's moved closer to the wall every day. They'd even started fishing _together _again, although Lassiter refused to spend more than two hours at a stretch in the man's hyper-critical company.

Marlowe was pleased at how well everything came together, and how quickly, and most importantly how _quietly_. Probably because she was dealing directly with the Chief, who wasn't going to let slip one damned word more than she wanted anyone else to know, and not working her way through official channels. Thus far there wasn't even a rumor of anything "fishy" about Carlton Lassiter's abilities. But that was going to change soon.

By special request and even more special dispensation, Marlowe was present in the observation room of Interrogation Room A on the day that Carolyn hired Psych for its first "case" under her supervision. She stood next to the Chief of police and watched through the two-way mirror.

Carolyn brought Shawn and Gus into the interrogation room where Carlton was already waiting, looking belligerent and uncooperative slumped in his chair with his arms crossed tightly over his chest and his face set in a ferocious scowl. On the table before him was a deck of playing cards. "Well, Mr. Spencer, you're the expert on these matters. I'll leave you to it."

"What, you want me to play cards with Lassie? What kind of case is this?" Shawn said.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Carolyn said innocently, "I thought you'd…you know…_divine_ what we're up to here. You're an experienced psychic, correct? You are being hired today to…hmm…provide _training _for a newbie to the field."

Shawn looked from the liaison to the detective and back again, then did the whole routine over twice more. "Wait…you're saying Lassie is…is…is…" He broke up laughing.

"Well, that's the objective of this exercise, isn't it?" Carolyn said, as though she saw nothing whatsoever to laugh at. She probably didn't - Marlowe hadn't noticed that she had much more sense of humor than her nephew, which is to say _very little indeed. _Unless the jokes were quirky in the extreme, and usually morbid, that is. "To find out what, if any, psychic abilities Detective Lassiter possesses. You _do_ know how this works, right?"

"Sure, sure," Spencer said. He drew out a chair, turned it around, and straddled it. He picked up the deck of cards and began to shuffle. "I flash cards at Lassifras there, he tells me what's on 'em. And gets 'em wrong, except for one or two by statistical coincidence. Because one thing we all know is true, Carlton Lassiter is _not_ psychic."

"You're the expert," Carolyn said. She turned to leave but Gus stopped her.

"Excuse me, Ma'am, but why am _I_ here?" he asked.

She shrugged. "I've asked myself that very question, Mr. Guster, but if your 'Magic Head' is some sort of facilitator for Mr. Spencer, maybe it'll do the same for Detective Lassiter. If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

She left them then, and joined the other women in the observation room. "Well, here goes nothing," she said as she closed the door behind her. They watched through the glass intently, none of them sure what was going to happen next. Carolyn and Marlowe had performed this test several times with Carlton but the real question was _would he work with Spencer?_

Shawn held up his first card. Marlowe saw it was the jack of clubs. "What'cha got for me, Lassiepants?"

"Ace of assholes," Carlton said.

"Good guess," Shawn said. He lay the card aside face-down on the table and drew another. The four of diamonds. "And this?"

"Seven of Labradoodles."

"They need to make that suit," Shawn said in an aside to Gus.

"You know _that's _right," Gus returned.

Carlton dropped his forehead onto the table. It was clear he had no intention of cooperating, but Marlowe could see that he was already tired of the game. Shawn held up another card. "Five of hearts," Carlton said instantly. Shawn started to set the card aside, then hesitated. The card was, indeed, the five of hearts. Shawn put the card in a separate pile from the two incorrect guesses.

"One's a gimmie, Lassie. Now what do we have?" He held up the three of diamonds.

"Three of diamonds," Carlton said promptly. He answered with similar ease the next five cards Shawn held up - the ace of spades, ten of clubs, six of clubs, queen of spades, jack of diamonds, and two of hearts. Lassiter did not bring his head up off the table even once, and neither Shawn nor Gus let on that he was pipping the ace on every attempt, though both looked more than a little bit thunderstruck. Finally Shawn surreptitiously drew a card from the middle of the growing stack of correct answers. "Six of clubs," Lassiter said, and then, "What the _hell?"_

"Neat. Neat trick. I gotta hand it to you, Lassie, this…this is funny. Did Jules put you up to this?"

"Put me up to what?"

Shawn started checking for hidden microphones under the table, on the chairs, and beneath Lassiter's collar, which effort earned him a hearty smack on the back of the hand. "How are you doing that?"

"What? Getting them _right?" _Lassiter said. "I dunno, Spencer. I guess I'm just _psychic_ or something."

"No, really - how are they feeding you the answers? I know wiretap tech has come a long way but this is downright creepy."

Lassiter pointed at Gus. "Magic Head. I guess it works for _everyone."_ On the other side of the glass, unseen and unheard by anyone in the interrogation room, Marlowe giggled.

Shawn fetched a melodramatic sigh. "Okay, let's keep going. I'll figure out your little trick, Lassie, never fear."

"When are you ever going to tell Henry the truth about the sliding glass door?" Lassiter said suddenly.

Shawn did a double-take. _"What?!"_

"You told him it fell off the track while you were closing it, but you accidentally shot it with your BB gun and staged the whole thing so you wouldn't get in trouble. You did a good job covering up the evidence - you had Henry and Madeline so relieved you didn't get hurt that neither of them suspected a thing. But you still feel guilty about it, which is sort of odd considering how many other, _worse_ things you've done since that you never think twice about. But maybe that's because when you were ten you still had a few scruples you've lost along the way."

"How did you know about that?" Shawn asked in a tight voice.

Lassiter shook his head. "I haven't got a fucking clue."

"Gus, did _you_ tell him about that?"

"How could _I_ have told him that, Shawn? I didn't even know it myself. I spent _weeks_ that summer tossing and turning at night, picturing what might have happened when poor little Shawn fell into that pile of broken glass, and it was all just a big, fat lie! You suck, Shawn. You really suck."

"I think I need to go, now," Shawn said, still in that tight voice, and stood and walked out. With a wary glance at Lassiter, Gus followed.

"I would pay real money to know what Spencer is thinking right now," Chief Vick mused aloud.

"Ask Carlton," Carolyn said. "Chances are, he can tell you."


	16. Chapter 16

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Seventeen: A Quiet, Normal Life**

It was a rare treat, the opportunity to watch him while he slept. Most of the time when Marlowe awoke Carlton was already awake and watching _her_, not that she minded. Even if he was asleep he was usually face down in the pillow, probably with the cat perched on the middle of his back. But this morning he was on his side, facing her, and she enjoyed the view immensely.

She'd mentioned, more or less in passing, that she liked the way his hair looked when he was getting shaggy so he'd left it to grow out a bit. It wasn't long enough to hang in his eyes but it was getting close (he'd never tolerate it any longer than it was now, she knew) and the light breeze through the open window made it dance. Early morning sunlight glinted off of silver threads in the black and she was never, _ever_ going to let him dye it. Occasionally the mischievous wind would blow a lock into his face and the juxtaposition of (mostly) black hair against (fairly) pale skin smoothed out by sleep made him look oddly, almost painfully young, like a ghost of who he might have been before the world stripped away his trust.

His dark lashes fluttered and his eyes blinked open, blurry with sleepiness. Marlowe smiled and touched his cheek. Usually his skin would be shadowed with prickly bristles by this time, but just this once it seemed he'd managed to keep up with his beard - he must have shaved just before coming to bed. She kind of missed the shadow, actually, but it did contribute to his currently oddly youthful appearance, which remained at least for these few moments where he was neither fully awake nor asleep. "Good morning," she said softly.

"Morning," he said in return. It was something of a relief that he was there and aware, sleep-muddled or not, and not having a psychic episode of some sort. Of course, it seemed that his admission had opened the floodgates, so to speak, and visions seemed to be coming more often and with less distraction involved. He also hadn't had a headache since coming clean to himself about it, except in the parking garage. Marlowe hadn't told him yet that it was where his father met his end, she didn't know how.

But that didn't bear thinking about at the moment. Of more importance was the comfort of the pillow top mattress and the cool sheets, the warmth of the man she snuggled against, and the feel of his early-morning erection. She nuzzled him and kissed the hollow of his shoulder as his arms came up around her to pull her closer against his long, lean body.

After a deliciously long and leisurely interlude, during which she thought she might have had her own version of a psychic vision or at least an intensely _in_-body out-of-body experience, they still had time to lay together for awhile and talk. They usually _didn't_ talk, Carlton was naturally disinclined and Marlowe thought they communicated very well without words, but it was clear that this once, he had something he needed to say.

"I…don't want to be the 'department psychic,'" he said after a few false starts. "I'll admit, I have had occasion to feel…rather jealous of the praise and media attention Spencer gets, but…that's just not the way I ever wanted to _get_ that attention. I worked hard to get where I am, whether or not my family connections are what earned me my position. I _enjoy _my work, most of the time, even the boring parts. I don't want my job to become a circus sideshow act. That kind of thing is for the Spencers of the world, the people who enjoy playing a crowd. I'm…happy just being an ordinary cop who has to work things out the hard way, particularly since doing it that way is actually easier than having to reverse engineer cases for Spencer so that the DA won't have a conniption about how we obtained our evidence. It might be slow going but I _get_ there, dammit, and I don't need a psychic dogging my every step telling me how stupid I am for not being able to see what he can see, which I'm fairly certain I _could_ see, at least in part, if I were as unconcerned with proper procedure as Spencer is." His face had flushed and his voice grew husky with increasing temper as he forgot that he was _not_ speaking to Shawn Spencer.

"Woah, calm down babe. He's not here," Marlowe reminded him. He blushed.

"I know, sorry. I shouldn't let him get me so hot under the collar but he does frustrate the hell out of me sometimes…_most _times. He's not so bad, I guess, and sometimes he can be downright noble, but those times are offset by all the times he acts like a complete jackass and pisses me off. The point I was trying to get to is that I feel like I'm being pushed to become something I don't want to be."

"I don't want you to be something you're not comfortable being, sweetie," Marlowe said, "I don't think anyone wants that. But you are what you are, honey, you can't change it and I don't think it's healthy to _try."_

"I know, I just…I don't want this to be how I'm defined, I guess. I don't want to be 'that psychic at the police department.' I'd much rather remain 'that asshole cop.'"

"I…suppose I understand that, even if I disagree with your assessment of how you're viewed."

He shrugged the shoulder he wasn't laying on. "I know how I come across to most people. Sometimes it's even deliberate."

"Well, setting that aside, how are you going to _keep_ people from defining you as a psychic?" Marlowe asked. "Something so major, it's kind of hard to keep it out of people's minds."

"I don't know," he said helplessly. "But I…I think I'm going to need your help with that."

Marlowe propped herself up on her elbow. "Of course, babe. I'll do whatever you need me to do."

"I…may need you to come with me to talk to Chief Vick, and maybe Aunt Carolyn, too, about…about what they're expecting from me. I need to put my foot down about this - I'm not refusing to be psychic, I just need them to know that I'm going to be a detective _first_. I've never been afraid to look any man in the eye and tell them just exactly which way the river runs, but I have a tendency to be overborne by women - _particularly_ Chief Vick and Aunt Carolyn, not that they're the _only _ones capable of manipulating me, or even the best at it," he said, with a wink and a kiss. "I'm not saying that this a bad thing or that I really mind - it's good that cooler heads prevail. But this time, I need to stand up for myself no matter what they have to say about it. I might need backup."

Marlowe smiled and kissed the tip of his nose. "I'll be right beside you."


	17. Chapter 17

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eighteen: Backup<strong>

_I'll be right beside you_, she'd said. So where the hell _was_ she? He'd asked her to come by the station at three, and it was now solidly three-fifteen. He was worried - it wasn't like Marlowe to be late, there could be trouble - but he also felt at least a little bit abandoned. By her, and also by that by-now nearly familiar uncomfortable _knowing_ feeling that should have told him if there was _reason_ to be worried.

"I got the toxicology report back from the M.E. for the Franklins case," Detective Reiger, a temporary transfer from the gang unit, said. He slapped the file folder down in the middle of Lassiter's desk. Driven to distraction, Lassiter barely noticed. "Came back clean. Cause of death looks to be a case of sudden cardiac arrest. I guess nobody offed him after all. Interesting thing, though - even though everyone said he'd spent the weekend dead drunk, there was no trace of alcohol in his system."

"Ethylene glycol," Lassiter said, scarcely aware he'd said anything.

"What?"

"His wife put it in his lemonade. Have the M.E. run another tox and tell him to look for it. It's not something they look for normally."

"Ethylene glycol. Frickin' _anti-freeze?"_

Lassiter shrugged. "It's a nasty way to kill someone but pretty damned effective. It tastes sweet so they don't really notice it, and it isn't found unless you know to look for it. But it's slow."

"But _you_ know to look for it. Did you…_sense _that's how she did it?"

Lassiter gave the man a black look. "There was no trace of alcohol in his system but witnesses all said he was dead drunk right up to the end. The symptoms of ethylene glycol poisoning are virtually indistinguishable from alcohol intoxication. There was a glass of lemonade on the bedside table that will almost undoubtedly yield trace samples of anti-freeze and more importantly _her_ fingerprints when the boys from the crime lab get back to me on it. But if you must know, yes, I 'sensed' that was how she did it. Once we have all our ducks in a row evidence-wise we'll have grounds for arrest."

Reiger was young, enthusiastic, and not terribly familiar with the Head Detective and his little peccadilloes. His face split in a huge grin. "Dude, that is so cool. You know, that Spencer guy said _he_ sensed that the step-son did it, although he didn't say anything about anti-freeze. You sure he's not right?"

Lassiter sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Spencer…_invariably _accuses two or three people wrongly before alighting on the correct suspect. I have two favorite theories as to why he does this, and you're welcome to take your pick: one) he does it to build dramatic tension, or, two) he's making wild ass guesses. Most likely it's a combination of both. One thing he is _not _doing is 'sensing' the solution to a case psychically. Because he's not psychic."

"But you are?"

"Unfortunately, it seems that I am."

"Everybody else says the _other_ guy is psychic."

"Everybody else is wrong."

"Can I ask you something?"

"If I say no, would that stop you?"

"Okay, first: is Bigfoot real? Second: what's in Loch Ness? Third: did aliens really build the Great Pyramid? And finally: when will I die?"

Lassiter _wanted_ to believe he was being mocked, but the young man was earnestly sincere in his interest. _Dude, that is so cool… _The kid probably filled his Tivo with _Ghost Hunters _and _Paranormal Files _and _Ancient Aliens_. The only remotely paranormal television show that Lassiter occasionally watched was _Destination Truth_, mostly because Josh Gates reminded him of a six foot, five inch Kermit the Frog and he was waiting for the guy to wave his arms in the air and holler "YAAAAAAYYYY!"

The kid was waiting for answers, apparently confident that Lassiter had them. "Unlikely, not much, don't be ridiculous, and very, very soon if you don't leave me alone."

"All right, all right. But how did you get to _be_ psychic, anyway? Were you, like, struck by lightning or something?"

Even a rookie detective unschooled in the care and handling of grouchy Heads couldn't miss the malice in the glare Lassiter gave him. "Make yourself useful and go down to the crime lab and see if you can hurry those boys along. And get Woody to check for signs of ethylene glycol poisoning."

"All right, all right, I'm going. Sheesh, I was only curious."

Three twenty-five. _Marlowe, where are you? _He pulled out his cell phone and hit the speed dial. She answered on the first ring. His heart turned over in his chest and his breath released in a massive sigh of relief.

"Hey babe - sorry, I didn't mean to be late. I would have called but I hoped to have this wrapped up quicker. I'm in the building and I'll be right there."

"Okay. See you soon."

"Bye-bye."

He hung up, only mildly curious about what it was Marlowe had to wrap up before meeting him. She was safe, not that he'd really thought otherwise. Safe, and on her way.

She walked into the Bullpen, sporting her laminated Visitor's Pass on a lanyard around her neck, less than a minute later. A few hesitant paces behind her was Juliet O'Hara.

"If you really need backup to talk to your aunt and the Chief," Marlowe said, "then I figured you'd better have _backup."_

Lassiter stood and wrung his hands nervously. "O'Hara…" he faltered. "Does this…mean you forgive me?"

"I think that's _my_ line," Juliet said. "Carlton, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to…to…_any_ of it. I didn't mean any of it. I was upset and angry and confused and I…I…I took it all out on you. Please forgive me."

"I will if you'll come back to Robbery-Homicide," Lassiter said. "And if you'll forgive _me_ for being an asshole and be my partner again."

"I'll talk to Chief Vick about being transferred back right away. Can I have a hug?"

Lassiter glanced warily at Marlowe, who merely smiled and nodded. Not entirely comfortable nevertheless, Lassiter allowed O'Hara to throw her arms around his middle while he patted her shoulders.

She pulled away at last. "There's a rumor making the rounds that you're psychic?" she turned the statement into a question.

He grimaced. "It's…true. To some extent, at least."

"When did _that _happen?"

He sighed. "It's a long story. I'll tell you later." He squared his shoulders manfully. "Well, let's get this over with, shall we?"

He walked to the door of Chief Vick's office and knocked. She bade him enter and, alone, he walked inside. In a few moments he poked his head back out and gestured his "backup" to follow.

"All right, Carlton, what's this about?" Vick asked.

"I think Carolyn should be here for this," Lassiter said.

Vick nodded and gestured for O'Hara, nearest the door, to call the woman in. Once they were all assembled, Carlton said what he wanted to say.

"I need to know exactly what the department is expecting of me now that it seems I have…shall we say, 'an extra skill set?'" he said. "As far as I'm aware, I cannot turn it on or off at will, I can't choose what, if anything, I learn from it, and God knows there's no way in hell I'll be testifying to any 'psychic visions' in a court of law, even if it _were_ considered acceptable evidence. So what is it you want from me: A psychic detective, or a detective who happens to be psychic?"

"And you only get one guess as to which of those is considered _acceptable," _O'Hara supplied. Lassiter nodded grimly.

"I take it you're afraid that your primary value to the police force will become your extrasensory perception?" Carolyn asked.

"And my life will devolve into more of a circus than it's already become in the years since we started working with 'psychics,'" Lassiter clarified. "I am a cop. And while I know I'm not the most personable or, at times, _reasonable_ individual, and while Spencer likes to put me down as much and as often as possible and point out to me that apparently _no one _respects me or anything I do, I figure there has to be a reason why I have remained Head Detective under your tenure as Chief, Karen. Perhaps I'm completely off-base about this, but I would have expected you to transfer or demote me long before now if I were _not _the best man for the position. And if I was the best man for the position _without _psychic powers, then that has to be enough. I'm not saying that I won't share visions that pertain to cases, I'm not stupid, but I expect that my day-to-day job will not _change_, that I will continue to work cases that are in all ways perfectly ordinary grinding, soul-crushing police work and not be 'reserved' only for those spectacularly ridiculous attention-grabbing locked-room mysteries that Spencer loves so very much. I am a _cop."_

"That sounds perfectly reasonable to me," Vick said. Carolyn nodded agreement. "In truth, I would be very disappointed in you if you _did_ want to be reserved only for those…er…unusual cases. You have remained my Head Detective because you _are _the best man for the job, you have the clearance record to prove it, and more than that, you are a man I _trust_. I need that trust in my senior-most officer, both in the field and in the bullpen. Your ability to perform the…_grinding_ aspects of police work is at least as valuable to me as your ability to effect arrests. And for the record, Carlton, Spencer is the only person who seems to have any doubt about how much you deserve respect."

Lassiter relaxed visibly. "Thank you, Chief. I…never should have doubted that you would keep me where I belong."

"I _do_ want to know exactly how you'll work with Psych now that you're…ah…playing on the other side of the plate," Vick said. "I've got a case I would have put in your hands regardless of current events, but now it provides a good opportunity to answer that very question. For all I know, it may no longer even be necessary or _advisable _to call in outside consultants. It's not a competition, mind, but the dynamic here at the station has almost undoubtedly changed, and I want to see how that reflects in the field. O'Hara, are you willing to partner back up with Lassiter on this?"

Juliet nodded. "I was going to talk to you about that very thing, Chief. I'm ready to come home."

"Good. I'll have the files transferred to your care as soon as possible, and Reiger can go back to the gang unit as soon as you've cleared the Franklins case."

"That won't be much longer, Chief - I'm just waiting on a few reports."

Marlowe put her hand on his shoulder. "See? And you were afraid this might go badly. Trust in people a little more, Carlton - you have more friends than you realize."


	18. Chapter 18

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**A/N: **The title is undoubtedly a gimmie but I had to do it, that's just the kind of corny-ass person I am. Inspired by a suggestion from Alyshebafan1. I also know that the ending of last chapter was remarkably _laissez-faire _for a high-pressure time-sensitive situation like a kidnapping, but at the time I had no idea what kind of case I was going to come up with and let's just assume this is "LATER THAT SAME DAY," 'kay? 'Kay.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Nineteen: Despereaux Measures<strong>

"Good afternoon, Detective Lassiter. How are you this fine Santa Barbara day?" Cheerful. Nonchalant. Through gritted teeth.

"Spencer," Lassiter greeted guardedly. It was the first time he'd seen the so-called psychic since the card test, and it was clear the man was on edge and trying hard not to show it. A few paces behind him, Guster smiled thinly and nodded a greeting but most of his attention was reserved for the back of his friend's head, as his eyes tried to bore a hole through to the man's brain so he could take control and keep Spencer from doing anything unduly stupid. Lassiter guessed the pharmaceutical salesman had warned Shawn to tread carefully and respectfully until they knew _exactly _what they were dealing with. He could almost find amusement in the likelihood that they were desperately analyzing the situation, wondering if this newly-psychic Lassiter they were presented with was an elaborate prank, a sting operation, or worst of all, the truth.

"The new liaison lady told me we're working together on a special case," Spencer said, still in that tight, falsely cheery voice. "A kidnapping."

"Jamie McCarty, nine years old, missing now for seven hours and no ransom demand," Juliet rapped out, pretty face grim. "There's an amber alert out but we've got no tips yet. We're coming in a little late on this and time is _not _on our side. If either of you are getting any visions about this we need to move quick."

"Is this another 'training session' for our newbie psychic?" Shawn asked. "Am I here as a safety net or…or what?"

"Actually, Chief Vick mostly wants to see whether the two of you will be able to work together anymore," Juliet said honestly, "but to my way of thinking two psychics are better than one, right? Let's just find this little girl and not worry about who's doing what."

Shawn turned his gaze back on Lassiter with obvious effort. "Well I would think our best first stop would be the parents, don't you agree? We might pick something up from them, or the last place the girl was seen."

"That would typically be my first move, yes," Lassiter said, with an honest effort not to sound sarcastic, for his partner's sake more than any desire to actually work with Spencer. "Do the two of you want to ride along with O'Hara and me or are you going to follow?"

"We'll follow, if that's all right," Shawn said. "Come on, Gus."

It was more than all right, actually. Lassiter hadn't spent five minutes alone with O'Hara yet in the wake of their reconciliation and while he anticipated a period of awkwardness it would be a thousand times better if it were just the two of them in the cruiser with no Shawn and Gus. He kissed Marlowe goodbye outside the door of the police department and returned her little wave as she headed out front to the parked Fusion and he and O'Hara headed for the reserved parking where the midnight blue Crown Victoria sat in the spot marked "Detective Carlton Lassiter." The next spot over was O'Hara's reserved parking space which was usually filled with her electric lime-colored VW Beetle, but today her own department-issued vehicle was parked there instead, the burgundy Crown Vic that had replaced the old gold one that was so dramatically totaled during the Thane Woodson case. Even the _memory_ of that collision made his head and shoulder ache.

"Wait, Carlton - " Juliet said as he started to climb behind the wheel - "don't you think maybe _I _should drive? So you can concentrate, maybe get a psychic vibe or something?"

Granted, the t-bone accident hadn't been O'Hara's fault, but he had pretty much decided he was never sitting in the passenger seat when she was behind the wheel _ever again. _"I do a lot better when I'm _not _concentrating, O'Hara," he said, and that was the truth as far as he knew. "Get in."

On the way to the McCarty house to speak with the frightened parents Lassiter kept his mind turning on the facts, scant though they were, of the case. A little girl who disappears out of her own front yard could very easily have simply wandered off, but the _speed_ of her disappearance within a watchful neighborhood indicated abduction. And if she were abducted then statistically it was most likely someone she knew, a neighbor or a relative or a friend of the family. His fingers gripped the steering wheel almost hard enough to bend it. He'd seen the end results of many such kidnappings, and even when they managed to find the child _alive_ it rarely felt anything like a victory, and in his experience seven hours was too long to hope for much.

_Just let her be alive, _he thought to himself. _Let us find her._

He stopped the car in front of the McCarty house and Gus parked the blueberry behind it. O'Hara went to the front door and knocked. Lassiter was right behind her until he happened to take a step directly over the last place witnesses said they saw the girl. Instantly the most intense feeling of _knowing _he could clearly recall socked him upside the head with near physical force. The first responding officer had already checked out the neighbors, but _he'd missed something._

He didn't waste time trying to explain what he was feeling. He didn't even take the time to call out. He turned and sprinted across the street on the diagonal, gun drawn, and disappeared around the back of a nearby house.

"Lassie? Where are you - " Spencer called out, but Lassiter didn't bother answering. Behind the house, nearly hidden behind a gigantic lilac bush and climbing ivy, stood a small toolshed. With blacked-out windows. The homeowner's "photography studio." Lassiter now knew the relatively innocent structure had been put to more nefarious purposes.

He wanted to kick the door in, but psychic visions didn't stand up in court as "probable cause." The man was inside, he knew that much. He was also knew that the girl was there, too, and still alive. Her condition beyond that fact he did not know.

He stood outside the door and listened, hoping for the slightest even _imaginary_ cue that he could later claim spurred his action. Juliet trotted up and took up silent position on the other side of the door. Their eyes met briefly and the clear communication between them, and the simple trust in his partner's gaze, went a long way to assuage his fears concerning the future of their working relationship.

Finally he heard something, a nearly-imperceptible sound like the sob of a frightened and in some way suppressed child. The sudden jerk of O'Hara's head showed him that _she'd_ heard it, too. It was enough, particularly with his partner to back up his word. With his loudest bellow - _"Police! Hands in the air!" _- Lassiter kicked in the door and leveled his weapon on the erstwhile photographer. With two armed officers pointing their guns at him, the man wisely surrendered and Lassiter cuffed him while O'Hara went to the aid of the girl, lying tied up on the floor with a pillowcase over her head. She did not _appear _to have been injured, but Lassiter used his police radio to call in for an ambulance in addition to suspect transport.

"Good job, partner," O'Hara said, once the suspect was in the cruiser and the girl and her weeping, grateful parents were on their way to the hospital. "I was afraid this was going to be one of those very unhappy endings."

"Did the EMTs say anything about her condition?" he asked.

"Well the doctors will have to figure out what really happened but the paramedics say there's no obvious sign of abuse. We may have gotten severely lucky here, Carlton - he might have been waiting to send a ransom demand or just for the neighborhood heat to die down."

"I doubt he'd risk waiting if his intentions were just to molest the child and get rid of her," Lassiter observed. "I bet we'll find he intended to extort the parents for cash."

"Not that it makes what happened 'all right,' but thank God for greed."

"I hear that."

Spencer sauntered up, hands shoved deep in the front pockets of his jeans. "Good job, Lass. Swift. Efficient. Got the job done. We really just need to work on your _communication_ skills, not that I hold out much hope."

"I don't think I'm required to waste time communicating my intentions with _you, _Spencer."

"You didn't say anything about what you were doing to Jules, either, and you probably kinda _should_ talk to your partner, right?"

"She was right behind me, so evidently she still trusts me enough that I don't have to waste time with words."

Shawn shook his head sadly, and Lassiter sensed that the man was covering up honest feelings of annoyance and perhaps a touch of jealousy. "No style, Lassie. No style at all."

"I suspect that little girl is glad I didn't waste any more time on the sort of pointless flailing you're so fond of, Spencer."

A news van pulled up and a reporter with cameraman in tow spilled out of the back like clowns out of a tiny car. Ordinarily Lassiter might have been quite happy to speak to the media about such a successful conclusion to a very sensitive case, but he felt no great desire to explain the situation or how he managed to effect the clearance. A look at Juliet was all he required to communicate his desire that she cover for him with the newshounds. He went to the Crown Vic and picked up the radio handset to call in.

"Mr. Spencer! Did you use your psychic talents to find the McCarty girl?" Lassiter heard the reporter asking. For once, and at least for the moment, he didn't care if Spencer took credit for the whole thing. He didn't hear what Shawn said, if anything. It couldn't have been much, because there wasn't time for the usual line of Spencer bullcrunch before the reporter started a new line of questioning, with a new subject in her sights. "Detective Lassiter! Do you have any response to the rumors circulating that you have suddenly developed your _own_ psychic abilities?"

"No comment," Lassiter growled as Juliet made a valiant effort to distract the reporter's aim. "Detective O'Hara is handing the dissemination of this case: speak to her."

"Detective Lassiter, is it true that there have been four other cases this year that you yourself solved with psychic visions?"

"That is absolutely not true," Lassiter said, and that was a fact - those instances hadn't, after all, been actual cases.

"Detective Lassiter - "

"O'Hara, let's get out of here," Lassiter interrupted, and Juliet climbed into the passenger seat. For some ungodly reason, Spencer climbed into the back as well. With a sigh and a roll of the eyes, Lassiter started the engine and pulled away from the still-expostulating reporter.

Spencer sat forward with his elbows on the seatbacks. He didn't say anything, and neither Lassiter nor O'Hara was inclined to start a conversation. But the man's attention span was only so long, and he couldn't make the whole trip back to the station without doing _something_ annoying. He began flicking Lassiter's ears.

"Knock it off," Lassiter growled. Flick. Flick-flick. With an inarticulate snarl, Lassiter reached over his own shoulder and grabbed Spencer's hand. When he did, he saw…everything.

He slammed on the brakes, forcing the driver of the car behind them to swerve to avoid a collision. As the little red Prius passed them the driver honked and flipped Lassiter the bird, although he shouldn't have been following so closely in the first place. Lassiter ignored it all. His mind reeled. His duty was clear, but there were compelling reasons why _performing_ that duty would be…unpleasant.

"Dude, Lassie - you trying to kill someone? Eyes on the road, man," Spencer said, oblivious. Hoping it would somehow change the truth he now knew, Lassiter let go of the man's hand.

"Carlton, are you all right?" O'Hara asked, sounding genuinely concerned. She had no idea how many concerns he now had for _her_. They started and ended with Spencer and in the middle was the name _Pierre Despereaux._

"I'm…fine," he said, and the lie tasted like the bottom of a dirty ashtray. He stepped on the accelerator and drove the rest of the way to the station in silence. He knew he had to do _something_, but he hadn't a clue as to what.

_Damn you, Spencer. Why do you always draw to the bad guys? _he thought. Now he was stuck with the dirty duty of deciding what had to be done about this whole disgusting situation, and on the basis of no concrete evidence, just a _knowing _that could not be denied. One thing he did know without having to think much about it, he and Spencer were going to have a nice little private chat.

_Soon._


	19. Chapter 19

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**A/N: **My title. Douglas Adams. Love everything about him. RIP. 'Nuff said.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Twenty: The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul<strong>

Lassiter slipped out of the station as soon as possible, without a word said about the vision he'd had to Spencer or anyone else. He wasn't thinking clearly enough yet to make a decision on what to do about it. Part of him wanted to go digging right away for the concrete evidence he'd need to levy a proper "aiding and abetting" charge against the fake psychic, and part of him wanted to forget everything he'd seen and just let it ride. He knew _that_ part of him would never win out, no matter how much this was going to hurt. It would hurt Spencer, yes, but it would also hurt Guster (even if he _didn't_ end up with charges of his own, and Lassiter wasn't certain yet that he wouldn't), Henry, the Chief, and most especially Juliet. And to some extent, Lassiter himself. The days when he had actually _wanted_ to arrest Spencer were long behind him.

He needed to talk to someone, a sympathetic ear, and O'Hara's was far from ideal. Safely alone in the driver's seat of the midnight blue Crown Victoria, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed Marlowe's number.

"Hey babe," she greeted, responding to the Caller ID. "What's up?"

"Hey, doll. I just wanted to call and let you know I'm on my way home."

"Already?" Marlowe sounded surprised and not a little shocked. "I was expecting you'd be home _late_, if at all. I hope this doesn't bode ill for your case?"

"Quite the opposite. We found the girl and she's going to be okay. Looks like the guy intended to ransom her - he didn't hurt her."

"You mean _you_ found the girl," Marlowe said in a tone that brooked no demurral. "That's excellent, sweetie. I'll break clear and head home right away - you must be starved."

"You…you're not home?" he asked dumbly. Of course he'd told her when she first moved in that she was free to come and go as she wished and that the Fusion was hers to drive as long as he had the Crown Vic, but she hadn't _said_ anything about going out, which unnerved him. He himself had been _assiduous_ in telling her about his comings and goings, not that he'd come or gone anywhere but to and from work.

"Yeah, Lucien called and asked if I wanted to grab a drink - purely platonic, of course, silly-billy. I would have called to let you know where I was going but I didn't want to bother you while you were working a kidnapping, of all things. He'll understand I've got bigger priorities than beers with the guys."

"He's got your number?" he asked, still feeling at least half-stupid.

She laughed lightly. "No. He has _your_ number, the one you gave him at some point while I was still in the clink. You were invited, too, and if you feel up to it you'd be more than welcome to head this way and join us, but I figure you've had a long day and want your supper more than a highball. But it's up to you."

Lassiter thought of Lucien, a dull young man who worked as a mini golf attendant (which was not, in Lassiter's opinion, a _job, _only a time-marker), and couldn't imagine spending a social evening in his presence even if he felt up to socializing, which he didn't. But he didn't want to be jealous and possessive, or even merely come _across_ that way, and he certainly didn't want Marlowe to arrive at the conclusion that he kept her around to cook his meals and scrub his countertops, so with only a moderate degree of reluctance (and more than a hint of disappointment), he said, "Oh that's okay, dear. You have a nice evening with your friend and I'll see you when you get in. I'll grab a burrito or something on the way home. I'm kind of tired, so I'll probably just go to bed."

"Are you sure? All right, then. I'll see you later, love. Bye."

"Bye," he said, a trifle disconsolate as he ended the call. He'd hoped for a little more argument, he supposed, or perhaps a query as to his state of mind. He _wasn't_ jealous, not of Lucien certainly, and he believed her when she said she had no carnal knowledge of her former roommates, but the peculiar (to him) living arrangement left some small niggling doubt way down deep in the back of his mind, a quiet, hard-to-ignore voice that occasionally piped up and said, "Well, of course that's what she'd _say."_

He was trying, so hard, to live in the twenty-first century, but it was tough, particularly since he'd seen very little about the twenty-first century to commend it. Precious little in the _twentieth_, even. Though he didn't have the strong religious objections to the arrangement that Guster had at times evinced, just the fact that he was currently _living in sin _left him feeling more than a little unsettled and even hypocritical. But he was once bitten, twice shy, and the thought of entering into the bonds of matrimony again scared him. He might have taken the plunge by now regardless if he had the slightest inkling that she'd say yes, but Marlowe, a "modern woman," as he thought her (quotation marks included, most of the time), seemed perfectly content with the status quo.

She needed freedom. He understood, more or less. He was a lot older than she was (eight years, a gap that seemed little more than a crack in the sidewalk to Marlowe but which sometimes felt to him like the Grand Canyon) and not very much fun even in the best of circumstances (an outright poop in the worst) so she certainly needed the occasional company of fun people her own age. And he had to let her have that company, even if it happened to be _male._

Even if he really, _really_ needed her to be there to help him unravel a tricky and emotional moral and professional conundrum, such as now.

Acting mostly on autopilot he pulled into a drive-thru and ordered something by rote, then stared at the unwrapped grilled chicken sandwich that had miraculously appeared in his hand with the realization that he had absolutely no appetite for it. He ate it anyway, though he found it devoid of flavor. It probably wasn't the drive-thru's fault. Afterward he stared at the handful of crumpled empty mayo-spotted paper wrapper and had no memory of what he'd eaten. He somehow made it home alive and unscathed despite not taking any particular note of the fact that he was driving, and flopped down on the loveseat in his darkened, empty living room in a state of deep perturbation of spirit.

Sloppy Joe the Very Slow, the cat whose movements, like those of the mighty glacier, could be measured only in terms of inches per year except when the dinner bell rang, hopped up onto the seat next to him with a soft, birdlike "brrr-brrr." Huge, round yellow eyes stared wonderingly at him and a large tufted paw landed on his knee. In all, it was a good imitation of human concern. Or maybe it wasn't an imitation. He'd already had occasion to think the cat was more human than a lot of people he knew. For the first time ever in his acquaintance with the animal, Lassiter put his hand out and scratched behind the cat's tall, tufted ears. Joe squeezed his eyes shut and purred appreciatively, his big upper canines - always prominent - were revealed still better in a sort of drooly half-smile. They gave him a vampiric mien, though there was little of the Nosferatu in his personality. Lassiter liked the fact that the cat didn't push for more affection, merely accepted the contact with due appreciation. He himself felt a lot better all of a sudden. He still hadn't the least idea how to solve the problem he faced with regards to Spencer's complicity in Pierre Despeareaux's run from justice, but his depression had mostly evaporated in the face of the animal's sympathy, or whatever it was. With his hand at rest on Joe's broad, furry back, he leaned back against the cushions and fell asleep.


	20. Chapter 20

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**A/N: **The song Lassiter sings to Marlowe is "And I Love You So" by Don McLean.

**Chapter Twenty-One: And I Love You So**

Marlowe poked her head cautiously through the front door. "I'm home," she called out, not terribly loud, afraid to disturb an exhausted sleeper. When there was no answer, she entered the condo and locked the door behind her.

She saw the back of Lassiter's silver-black head resting on the back of the loveseat and she came around the front, where she saw him sound asleep with his hand still resting on Sloppy Joe's back. The cat, too, was curled up asleep, his chin and one paw resting on Lassiter's knee. Marlowe smiled and leaned in to plant a kiss just above Lassiter's left brow. His eyes blinked open and, after a moment's confusion, he smiled at her.

"Hey," he said, stretching sleepily. "When did you get in?"

"Just now. Sorry I woke you," Marlowe said.

Lassiter glanced at his watch and was surprised to discover that he'd been home only a half an hour or so. "Well you didn't stay out very long," he observed. "Nothing happened, did it?"

"No, but I just didn't care to stay any longer. Lucien is a nice guy and a good friend, and God knows I don't exactly have a lot of friends left, but he's not _you. _He understood."

"Well, I'm sorry your evening was cut short," Lassiter said. She put her arms around his neck and climbed into his lap, carefully avoiding the still-motionless cat, who merely opened one yellow-gold eye and looked at her without much interest.

"I'm not," she said, and kissed his nose. He put his arms around her and reveled in the simple comfort of holding her. She tucked her head under his chin, nuzzling his neck, and he kissed the top of her head. Then he did something he had never done in her presence, and only rarely before in the presence of any living soul. Quietly, hesitantly, he began to sing:

"_And I love you so._

_The people ask me how,_

_How I've lived 'til now._

_I tell them I don't know._

"_I guess they understand_

_How lonely life has been._

_But life began again_

_The day you took my hand._

"_And yes, I know how lonely life can be._

_The shadows follow me, and the night won't set me free._

_But I don't let the evening get me down_

_Now that you're around me._

"_And you love me, too._

_Your thoughts are just for me._

_You set my spirit free._

_I'm happy that you do._

"_The book of life is brief,_

_And once a page is read,_

_All but love is dead._

_That is my belief._

"_And yes, I know how loveless life can be._

_The shadows follow me, and the night won't set me free._

_But I don't let the evening bring me down_

_Now that you're around me._

"_And I love you so._

_The people ask me how,_

_How I've lived 'til now._

_I tell them…I don't know."_

After his voice faded out silence reigned in the condo for a nerve-wracking moment. He felt, in some ways, as nakedly exposed to her as that first horrible drunken telephone call when she tried to warn him about her brother's intentions and he was simply too inebriated and emotionally shattered to listen. Then she broke the silence with a single word.

"Carlton."

"Yes?"

"Take me to bed."

He stood up immediately, scarcely noticing her weight in his arms or the distant protest of his back - though he would feel it in the morning, a small price to pay. "Yes, ma'am."

He carried her through the condo to the bedroom and maneuvered her through the door. He laid her down on the bed and knelt down on the floor next to it. He stroked her hair and gazed into her eyes until, with a grin, she told him to quit beating around the bush and get naked. He chuckled deep in his throat and complied with vigor and alacrity. Later, swimming through a deep, warm ocean of love and comfort, he came to a happy realization: It didn't matter what happened with Spencer and O'Hara and that whole bloody mess looming on the horizon. It would be hell, that was certain, but here and now the whole thing was meaningless, and always would be as long as he was in this place, with this woman. This was something self-contained, and nothing in the wide world outside could touch it, or mar it's beauty.

She fell asleep in his arms and he lay awake, watching her. He was happy, beyond any sense of the word that he had ever experienced before. He knew that it wouldn't last - in the morning he would have to face the reality of an unhappy situation and he would, for good or ill, have to come to a decision of action about it - but he also knew that he would be happy again when he came home, and that was a very new experience. For the first time he knew, without reservation, this was real. This was _his._

And for the first time, perhaps, in his entire life, he fell asleep smiling.


	21. Chapter 21

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Twenty-Two: Fair Warning**

"Guster, can I speak with you a moment? Privately?"

Gus looked at Shawn, currently at Juliet's desk, sneaking M&Ms out of her bottom drawer and yammering away at her to keep her distracted while he stole her munchies, and then back at Lassiter. "Okay," he said slowly. Lassiter jerked his head in the direction of the conference room and allowed the pharmaceutical salesman to precede him into the room with the drawn blinds. Ever since the Prospect Gardens incident, Guster had been more than a little nervous about being left alone with Lassiter, for which he could scarcely be blamed, and he kept a wary eye on Lassiter as he closed the door. Lassiter turned too quickly from the door into the room, and the sudden twinge in his back was a reminder of the events of the previous night and the fact that he was getting too old for such exertions without consequences.

Guster saw him wince. "You hurt your back?" he asked.

"I…might have put a little kink in it," Lassiter said, not quite able to suppress the ghost of a grin. "Look, Guster…you'd probably better have a seat."

Gus pulled out a chair and sat down, the look on his face telling that he knew this wasn't going to be good.

Lassiter pulled out a seat himself, sat down, sighed, and ran a hand through his hair - delaying tactics, as he well knew. Better simply to have out with it.

"I know that Pierre Despereaux is alive," he blurted, "and I know that he used the Psych business account to funnel his money out of the country. I don't have any _evidence_, but I know it happened."

Guster's face turned a sickly gray, but to his credit he didn't start babbling lies. Before he said anything at all, Lassiter held up a forestalling hand. "I don't want to hear a word, and I mean that. As I said, I have no evidence, nothing to charge you with, and I'm not exactly keen to slap any cuffs on you when I know this wasn't something you'd have gone along with willingly, so I don't want to hear anything that could be taken as a confession. I just wanted to give you fair warning of the impending shitstorm, give you a chance to decide how you're going to deal with it."

"What are you going to do?" Gus asked dully.

"I'm going to talk to Spencer, tell him what I know, and give him what I hope will be a very simple choice."

"What choice?"

"Talk to O'Hara, tell her the truth - about Despereaux, about his abilities, about every lie he's ever told her, even the little white ones - or get the hell out of my town. If he chooses to run, you'll probably be okay. If he tells O'Hara the truth then I expect the shit to fly and I think we'll all probably get a taste of it by the end. But O'Hara deserves the truth, I think, and I'm going to see she gets it, no matter what the consequences are."

"If he confesses to…something, then you and Juliet will have to arrest him, right?" Gus said. "You're giving him a choice between running away or going to jail."

Lassiter shook his head. "I won't be there if he talks to O'Hara. If I heard an admission of culpability I would have to arrest him, that's just who I am. But O'Hara will make her own choice. I honestly couldn't guess whether or not she'll arrest him, and at the moment I honestly couldn't tell you whether or not I think she should. It may be a moot question, because I think there's a better-than-even chance he'll scarper."

Guster gave that concept a moment's solemn consideration. "I think there's a _better_ than better-than-even chance," he said at last. "If he does run, you'll tell Juliet the truth yourself?"

Lassiter sighed. "I don't know that right now. I think that I would have to tell her that I know why he left, that I was responsible for putting the run on him, and from there I'm not certain that I could _not_ tell her the whole truth. But I don't know that hearing it from me would be a good thing for her. It's something I might try to avoid, if at all possible. Whatever happens, though, I don't think _you _need to worry about criminal charges. Spencer has enough honor, I think, not to throw you under the bus. And I'm sure he could avoid serving time, as well, if he'll tell what he knows about Despereaux's whereabouts."

"I expect he's somewhere that there's no extradition," Guster said cautiously. Lassiter nodded.

"I hope it's someplace very interesting, because he's going to have to stay there. Even stepping into an international airport will be a hell of a risk for a dead man."

Lassiter stood up then and held out his hand. A bit warily, Gus shook it. "I'm sorry about all of this, Guster," he said honestly. "I'd rather have never found out about any of it."

"Are you…_really_ psychic?" Gus asked.

"Yes. Unfortunately."

Guster peered at him closely. "You know what? I believe you."


	22. Chapter 22

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Twenty-Three: Desperados Under the Eaves**

In the end, while it was an ugly confrontation by any definition, it was perhaps not as bad as Lassiter had expected. Shawn denied, whined, burst into tears on several occasions (twice they were obviously false tears, and the rest of the time they were tears of pique rather than remorse, which didn't surprise Lassiter in the slightest), pitched a couple of tantrums, and once Lassiter was actually compelled to put him in a chokehold, but once Lassiter put the scale of the event in perspective he supposed he could say that Spencer really wasn't any more immature about it than he was about anything else, and realized it was useless to keep acting like…well, himself…relatively quickly.

"So this is it, then, eh? You finally figured out how to get rid of me," Shawn said, more than a little breathless from his last tantrum and the chokehold. "No more Psych, no more competition, and most importantly, no more _me_ with Jules. You must feel like its your birthday."

"You're free to think what you want of me, Spencer," Lassiter growled. "The truth is you did this to yourself, and even though I don't want to see O'Hara hurt over this, _she deserves the truth_. She deserves to hear it from _you, _but frankly I don't expect you to have the necessary testicular fortitude to man up and tell her, so for her sake I'm granting you the chance to run for it. Because if you don't tell her, and I ever see you again? - you're a dead man, I guarantee it."

"And after I tell her, you swoop in and send me to jail for aiding and abetting a criminal."

Lassiter shook his head. "Whether or not you get arrested will be up to O'Hara. I told you I was giving you a chance, Spencer, and I meant it, but it's for _her_ sake, not yours. If not for her, you'd be on your way to lockup right now. The fact is, I care more about my partner's feelings than I care about why you're so sympathetic to racketeers and international criminals."

"You're really just going to let me walk away?" Spencer asked incredulously. "You?"

Lassiter nodded. "Run away, little man. O'Hara deserves better than a gutless liar."

The insults to Spencer's manhood were calculated. He hoped the man's pride and need to prove Lassiter wrong would impel him to act out of character and make his confession, but he wasn't going to hold his breath waiting for it. It was at this moment, when he had Spencer dead to rights and on the ropes, that his cell phone rang.

"_You are my sweetest love, that love I only want to hug," _the cartoon-bunny voice sang. Spencer's currently bloodless lips twitched as Lassiter quickly thumbed the cellular to quiet.

"Marlowe's ringtone?" he asked. "Dude, you are so whipped, although I don't suppose you mind. So. Am I free to go, then?"

"Yeah, you're free to go."

"Well, I'll see you later, then, Snuggle-Bunny. Or are you Marlowe's 'Tiger Boo?'"

"Get out of my face, Spencer, and remember: I'd better _not _see you later unless you've grown a pair."

In truth he wasn't at all unhappy that Spencer had heard the embarrassing ringtone. How odd, and more than a little ironic, that he was now counting on the man's sense of superiority to make him do the honorable thing. Spencer left and Lassiter dialed in the number for Marlowe's cell. "Hey, sweetie - sorry I couldn't answer your call. I was in the middle of something. Do you need anything?"

"No, I just wanted to ask if you were going to be late coming home," Marlowe asked.

"Nope, I'm all done here now and I was planning on coming home right now."

"Fantastic. Are you hungry?"

Lassiter considered. "Fairly, I guess. Why?"

"Because I left work 'in a mood,' as Adrian used to say. I went grocery shopping and went a little crazy, then I came home and got crazy with the pots and pans."

"Er…crazy how? Like strychnine and Drain-O crazy?"

She laughed. "No, like breaded squid, roasted red peppers, _stracciatella alla romana_, and some lovely broiled steak with wine and mushroom sauce crazy, with gelato for dessert and some nice, crusty rolls."

"Mm, that's the kind of crazy I like. What's s-streaky a-telly Ray Romano?"

She laughed again. _"Stracciatella alla romana," _she corrected. "It's how you say 'yummy' in Italian. A delicious rich soup with egg and cheese."

"Well, if I wasn't hungry before I can guarantee you that I am now. I'll be right home."

"Good. I'll see you soon, lover."


	23. Chapter 23

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Chapter Twenty-Four: What Big Ears You Have**

The evening was far more enjoyable than the day had been. A delicious dinner (he even managed to eat an entire portion of breaded squid, to please Marlowe, although it was an experience he didn't care to repeat any time soon), pleasant conversation, and sweet sex successfully alleviated the concerns of the day.

Sometime after midnight, the phone rang. It was SOP for Lassiter to be yanked out of bed in the middle of the night by an urgent telephone call, so it was only with minimal crankiness that he growled his name into the receiver.

"Carlton…?" It was O'Hara's voice, and she sounded weepy.

He sat fully upright. "O'Hara? What's wrong?"

"I'm s-sorry to wake you, but…" There was the sound of a muffled sob. "…can I come over? I really, really need to talk."

_Sweet Lady Justice,_ Lassiter thought, scarcely able to believe it, _he told her. Or he's skipped town. That could make her cry, too, I suppose._

"Yeah, all right - come on over," he said, with a glance at Marlowe next to him in the bed. She was looking a question at him so he mouthed the words "O'Hara's coming over to talk" at her.

"Thank you, Carlton," O'Hara said over the phone. "Again, I'm sorry to impose."

"Don't worry about it, Juliet," he said. "Just come over."

He hung up the phone, climbed out of bed, and dressed in a pair of pajama pants, a gray t-shirt, and his bathrobe. Marlowe put on her own pajamas and climbed back under the covers.

"I hope there's nothing seriously wrong?" she ventured. Lassiter sighed.

"I didn't ask what's happened," he said, "but I strongly suspect that her boyfriend has made an unwelcome confession. Prompted by me. Under threat of death. Which means that as unhappy as Juliet is likely to be with him, she'll probably be equally as angry with me, at least once she finds out that part."

"I see. Well, I was going to assume you'd want some privacy, but if you think you need backup…"

Lassiter smiled. "I appreciate the offer, but I think I can handle it. We'll stay in radio contact, though."

"Good. And honey?"

He turned back at the bedroom door. "Yes?"

"No hanky-panky."

He grinned wickedly. "No promises. You know the ladies can't keep their hands off me."

She tossed a pillow in his direction, hard, but he ducked back behind the jamb in time to dodge it.

In about fifteen minutes there was a knock at the door. Lassiter answered it, and Juliet O'Hara spilled over the threshold and wrapped her arms around his shoulders as far as she could reach.

"I'm sorry, Carlton. You were right all along, and I didn't listen. I put our partnership on the line for a stupid mistake and worse, I put our _friendship _on the line. Please say you can forgive me. Why didn't I _listen?"_

_Little girls never do, _Lassiter thought, _not when it comes to love. Little boys never listen, either. God knows I got plenty of warnings and good advice about Victoria that I didn't take._

"It's okay, O'Hara," he said, as soothingly as he could manage. "Come in, have a seat. You want some coffee or something?"

"No thank you, I'm fine," she said, and wiped her eyes on the Kleenex he handed her from the dispenser on the end table.

Lassiter sat down next to her. "Shawn…told you about Pierre Despereaux, I take it."

She nodded. "I just got out of Booking. I arrested him. Shawn, I mean. The Feds are going to have to track down Despereaux. I told Shawn to cut a deal with them. I don't think he'll do time."

Lassiter nodded and tried to school his expression. He wasn't entirely happy to think of _anyone_ getting away with a crime, whether it was their initiative or not, but while he wouldn't be doing cartwheels if Spencer _had_ to face the prospect of hard time, he didn't want O'Hara to _think_ he would.

"You know I'm the one who forced his hand on this, right?" he asked. "I 'saw' what he'd done when I grabbed his hand in the cruiser after the McCarty case. I didn't have any evidence against him, nothing that I could take to court, but I…well…I couldn't stand the thought of him lying to you about who he really is. I know it hurt you, and I'm sorry. If you want to be mad at me about it, I figure you've got the right."

She shook her head. "Shawn told me you gave him an ultimatum. I think he was _hoping _that I'd be angry at you, but I'm not. You were being a good friend, something he really doesn't know much about. I see that, now, and I'm through with being played. Maybe Gus will wise up, now, too. He doesn't deserve to be treated the way he lets Shawn treat him."

"Since you mention Guster, might I ask if Shawn said anything about his potential involvement in this mess?"

"He said Gus didn't know anything about it."

Lassiter nodded, relieved. He knew it wasn't true, but he was glad that Shawn had enough of a sense of honor to spare his friend, who would not have gone along with the scheme willingly in the first place. It showed him that he hadn't been wrong to see _something _redeemable in a man who otherwise struck him as so utterly _irredeemable._

"So what now for you?" he asked. "I mean, how are you dealing with this?" _Please tell me you've dumped the liar._

She took a deep breath and let it out slow, with a visible stiffening of her spinal column. "Now…I call it 'lesson learned,' I guess. Spend a little time rebuilding the relationships that broke down while I was focused too much on Shawn and his ego, and on rebuilding my reputation as a dedicated, objective officer of the law."

"No one has ever doubted your dedication, O'Hara."

"_You _did," she said. _"And _my objectivity, big time. That's why you wanted a different partner, isn't it? When you first found out."

Lassiter sighed. "I…was hurt, O'Hara, because you didn't tell me. I overreacted."

"Because I lied to you," she said quietly. "Because I broke your trust in me."

"I only have myself to blame," he insisted, though he wasn't entirely certain why he was attempting to contradict her for saying out loud what he'd actually been thinking. "I never gave you reason to expect me to react rationally to what you had to say, so I made it easy for you to choose to keep me in the dark as long as possible."

"_Would _you have reacted rationally?" she asked.

He gave the question serious consideration. "I wouldn't have been pleased," he said honestly, "but I don't think I would have gone to Vick about a transfer of partnership. I'll never know for _certain, _but I _think_ I would have been smart enough to appreciate the fact that you were being open with me. I was, after all, able to shove my personal feelings about Spencer aside, for the most part, after the initial shock wore off. I want you to be _happy_, partner, whoever it is you're happy with - and I would have eaten roofing nails and razor blades rather than bring my own brand of discord into your happiness just because I didn't happen to think the guy was good enough for you."

She looked at him consideringly for a bit, and then nodded slowly. "I believe you would," she said at last. "You're my best friend, Carlton - I don't think I ever told you that."

"Yeah, well, I think you're aware of the fact that I don't have a very deep pool to draw from, but ditto, partner."

She stood up. "Well, I don't mean to keep you up all night, I just needed to kvetch a little. I feel better now, and I know you've got my back so I'll be all right. I'd give you a big kiss, but I'll leave that job to Marlowe. Tell her to give you an extra good one from me, all right? Goodnight, Carlton."

He saw her to the door. "Goodnight, O'Hara. And whenever you feel the need to kvetch, you know I've got big ears."


	24. Chapter 24

**Disclaimer: **I don't own _Psych_ or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

**Rating: **T

**Spoilers: T**hrough season six finale, "SantaBarbaratown"

**Epilogue: Under Fire**

Life went on, as it has a way of doing despite the best efforts of humanity to blow itself up. Shawn Spencer cut a deal with the FBI and was not prosecuted for concealing his knowledge of Pierre Despereaux's whereabouts, and with the aid of a mysteriously accurate anonymous tip, the notorious art thief was at last brought to justice. Shawn himself left Santa Barbara soon after making his confession, and even those who loved him the most were understandably relieved by the absence of his all-consuming presence in their lives.

Within four months, Marlowe discovered that she was pregnant. The weight of tradition at last overbalanced the fear of matrimony and Lassiter popped the question. Marlowe's rapid acceptance prompted him to wonder whether he'd really had to wait so long. Their son, Dashiel Alexander Lassiter, was born six months later. He weighed nine pounds, seven ounces at birth, and the nurses at the hospital were absolutely certain he was destined to be a future NBA star. He dwarfed all the other babies in the neonatal unit. His eyes proved to be blue, only slightly darker than his father's, and his ears were, just possibly, a trifle outsized. At his baptism, Juliet O'Hara stood as his godmother.

For the most part, life was good. Around about the time he put that diamond on Marlowe's finger, Lassiter lost most of the last vestiges of his fear of abandonment. If there was anything that kept him from complete contentment, it was the knowledge that, for the most part, his relationship had navigated calm seas. He didn't know if it could really last through the rough stuff, situations that were harder to deal with than a year-and-a-bit in prison. With his job, and the way he performed it, those times were almost inevitable. Sooner or later, Marlowe would realize just how tough being married to a cop could be.

His psychic visions came and went at their own sweet will, and he rarely attempted to force one. Sometimes they came one after another, like waves on the beach, for weeks on end, and sometimes he went months without a tickle of the paranormal. It was during a lengthy dry spell that he and O'Hara chased a Murder One suspect into an underground parking facility not far from Prospect Gardens.

They found the suspect's car abandoned on the second level so they left the safety of the cruiser and set out on foot, guns drawn. O'Hara radioed in their situation and requested backup. Buzz McNab radioed back that he was in the vicinity and was on his way. Other officers would move to block the exits of the facility. When the vision came, O'Hara, for once in sensible flat-soled shoes, was a few steps to Lassiter's right and slightly ahead of him.

He saw the bullet strike O'Hara in the center of her forehead. He saw her fall, dead where she stood. Shouting a warning might only precipitate fire and he didn't have a clear shot himself, so he did the only thing he could think of to do: he took one giant step in her direction and pushed her down. The bullet struck him high on the right side of his chest.

He didn't lose consciousness, although it hurt badly enough that he almost wanted to. He saw O'Hara rise and return fire, and then he saw McNab arrive and call in the dreaded "Officer Down" while O'Hara finished up the dirty work. EMTs were on site with remarkable speed and he was loaded into the back of an ambulance in short order.

O'Hara and McNab looked at each other with mutual apprehension as the vehicle sped away. "You go to the hospital," Buzz said once he found his voice. "I'll…I'll go talk to Marlowe."

. . .

. . . .

Marlowe rocketed along in the back of Officer McNab's cruiser. He had the sirens blaring and was driving so fast that they actually managed to draw within sight of the ambulance ahead of them. With Dashiel in his car seat buckled up next to her, Marlowe would actually have preferred that McNab _not_ drive quite so fast, but she didn't contest his speed.

In the ER it was a long wait with a tired and confused two-year old before anyone could tell her anything other than "please fill out these insurance forms." Finally a tall, jolly-looking doctor came into the waiting room.

"Mrs. Lassiter?" he said. Even after two years and under the circumstances being addressed that way still had the power to bring an answering grin to her lips.

"Yes, that's me," she said. She stood up and hoisted Dashiel into her arms.

"I'm Doctor Raedecker. I'm having your husband admitted to the hospital but I don't expect it to be a long stay - he's going to be just fine. You and this handsome young man can see him as soon as they've finished moving him."

Marlowe felt the lead weight in her chest dissipate like a cloud of water vapor. "Oh, thank God," she said.

"Have you ever…erm…'dealt' with Detective Lassiter when he's in hospital?" Dr. Raedecker asked.

"No, I haven't."

"Then perhaps I should tell you that the last time he was admitted, the nurses on his ward threw a party on the day he was released. And he was only in for three days."

Marlowe chuckled. "I'll see to it he behaves himself."

. . .

. . . .

"Take your pile of virulent medical waste and shove it down someone _else's_ throat," he was saying.

"It's _lime Jell-O_, Detective," the nurse's aid said in clear exasperation.

"I don't care what you call it, I'm not eating it."

Marlowe breezed into the room. "Hey, Dash, look - Daddy gets Jell-O for a snack. That's your favorite, isn't it? You want to help him eat it?" She took the plate from the grateful nurse's aid and Dashiel picked up the fork.

"Open up, Daddy - here comes the airplane," the toddler said.

The obstinate expression fell off of Lassiter's face instantly, and was replaced by a rather more sappy look. In obedient silence he opened his mouth and allowed his son to feed him the noxiously toxic-looking gelatin.

Marlowe looked at the bemused nurse's aid with sympathy and humor in her eye. "Baby soothes the savage beast," she said.

"I guess so," the nurse's aid, whose name tag read "Tammi," said. "When we got word they were sending him to the ward the nurses who'd been here longest all started telling about _other_ times he'd been here. They sounded like _war stories."_

"Tell them I promise he'll be nice this time. _Nicer_, at any rate."

Tammi left to relay the message and Marlowe pulled up a chair. "Sounds like you're a congenital bad patient," she said.

"I hate laying around with nurses flitting in and out every five minutes," Lassiter said, with a brief return to grumpiness.

"Daddy, mommy said you can't come home tonight. Why not?" Dashiel asked.

"I don't know, Dash."

"_Carlton," _Marlowe said.

Lassiter sighed. "I have to stay in the hospital tonight, Dash, because I got hurt at work."

"Did a Bad Guy hurt you?"

"Yeah, Dash."

"Is he dead now?"

"No, but he's in jail, and he's going to stay there for a long, long time."

"Good."

"Juliet said you saved her life," Marlowe said.

"I suppose so," Lassiter said.

"Vision?"

"Yeah."

"And there was no other way to do it without getting shot yourself?"

"Not that I could think of, at any rate. Didn't have much time."

"Then I suppose I won't be angry with you."

"I appreciate it, Babe. If it makes you feel any better, I was fairly certain I wouldn't die. O'Hara wasn't wearing heels, and she's such a shrimp - I knew I'd probably take it in the shoulder."

"O'Hara's not a shrimp, Legs, just because you're walking around on built-in stilts. And it doesn't make me feel a _whole lot _better, actually."

He was silent for awhile, and then, "It's not the first time I've been shot, you know."

"Is _that_ supposed to make me feel better? Because it _really_ doesn't."

He shook his head. "What I mean is, it's not the first time, and there's always a chance that it won't be the last. A pretty _good_ chance, I'm afraid, because while I don't _usually_ go out of my way to get shot at, I do get involved in violent conflicts more often than most detectives in Santa Barbara. Probably in California, actually. Maybe the whole country."

"So what are you trying to tell me?"

"I could've died, you know. It's part of the job. I put my life on the line for others, whether I know them or not."

"I…I know that, Carlton."

"So…do you still like being married to a cop?" he asked shyly.

Juliet O'Hara had been standing just outside the door for the last five minutes. "Juliet, could you take Dash down to the waiting room area and get him some juice from the vending machine?" Marlowe asked.

"Of course. Come on, Dash-Board, I'll let you push the buttons," she said, and took the little boy down the hall.

"Well," Marlowe said when they were out of earshot. "Let's consider this, shall we? Let's say, hypothetically, that you died. Killed in the line of duty, in a car crash, of some horrible disease, or struck by an asteroid. What would I do? Well, I suppose I would cry. A lot. For a long time. And I would take comfort in Dash. And I would see him through puberty alone and wish I had you there to handle all the icky parts of that for me. And I'd cry some more. And I'd sit up all night waiting for him to come home from his first date, and I'd sit in the bleachers alone on the day he graduates from high school, and I'd cry a lot. But I'd smile a lot, too. Because I'm proud of our son, of course, but also because I'd know that, no matter how alone I might look in the middle of those crowded bleachers, you're really right there with me. Inside. Where I'll always keep you, no matter what happens. Because I love you. And that's enough to hold me up, no matter how hard being married to a cop can be."

Lassiter felt tears pricking his own eyes, and because he felt so sentimental he joked, "So you wouldn't run right out and get remarried."

"That depends," Marlowe said, in the same mock-serious tone. "If some gorgeous, intelligent, sweet-natured twenty-seven year old multi-billionaire asked me, I'd certainly be stupid not to jump at that."

"Would that still be true if I _weren't_ hypothetically dead?"

"Let's say I'd give you two weeks to come up with a better offer."

Lassiter laughed. "I adore you. Even more than my Glock."

"You're so romantic. With lines like that, I suppose that twenty-seven year old doesn't stand a chance."

"Can the convalescent man have a kiss from his beloved wife?"

"Of course he can."

**FIN**


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